DANIELLE BRATHWAITE-SHIRLEY, ‘UNCOMFORTABLE HONESTY, ‘2024. Ink on paper, digitally enhanced. Courtesy of DANIELLE BRATHWAITE-SHIRLEY
This autumn, the Serpentine Arts Technologies programme presents a bold new chapter in its ongoing exploration of creative technology: a major video game art exhibition by artist and game-maker Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley at Serpentine North in London. Opening in September 2025, the project brings together immersive storytelling, participatory gaming, and creative R&D in a way that challenges traditional exhibition formats—and invites visitors to play a vital role in shaping the narrative
A groundbreaking commission at Serpentine art gallery
Produced and commissioned by Serpentine Arts Technologies, the project continues the gallery’s forward-thinking work at the intersection of art and technology. Brathwaite-Shirley’s upcoming solo exhibition builds on years of collaboration with Serpentine, expanding her investigation into how video game technologies can be reimagined as civic and creative tools.
At the heart of the show will be a newly developed video game, conceived not simply as an artwork, but as a performance infrastructure—a living, evolving system that responds directly to audience input. Set within a fully immersive installation, the work transforms Serpentine Art Gallery’s North space into a hybrid arena: equal parts game, social experiment, and archive of collective choices. Visitors step into the work not as viewers, but as agents whose presence and decisions drive the unfolding story.
The vision of Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley
Berlin- and London-based artist Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley—known for her powerful, multi-platform works that center Black Trans lives—has long combined personal storytelling with speculative futures. Working across animation, sound, performance, and digital design, she draws inspiration from early adventure games, improv theatre, and the shifting dynamics of online communities. Her practice embraces fiction not as fantasy, but as a tool for survival, memory, and radical possibility.
This upcoming exhibition furthers that ethos. It is designed to implicate the visitor deeply, activating the player as co-creator. In doing so, Brathwaite-Shirley continues her mission to archive, uplift, and imagine Black Trans histories, while testing the limits of audience engagement in a
Step inside the world of Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley, where video games become archives of memory and emotion. In our interview, she reflects on storytelling, responsibility, and building art spaces that center Black Trans lives.
