MX Oops
UnFiNiShEd aNiMaL
Bio/About
MX Oops is a NYC-based dancefloor mystic, transmedia artist, and educator. Their performances use the ecstatic disobedience of queer club culture to expand and deepen the senses, especially our sense of connection to each other. Their work has been presented across the U.S., Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Caribbean.
UnFiNiShEd aNiMaL is a party and multimedia performance exploring what is unfinished in human consciousness. Media are extensions of the senses and here all of the senses are extended as a call to action to remember the club can be a place to center the sacred.
UnFiNiShEd aNiMaL was developed in the Live Feed Creative Residency at New York Live Arts with support from the National Performance Network (NPN) Creation Fund.
Residencies/Support
Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship - Dance
Barnard College
University of Florida
University of Maryland
New Waves! Dance Institute Artist-In-Residence
BLOOMFest, Accra, Ghana
Performances
New York Live Arts 2024
Queerium, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic 2025
New Waves! Festival 2025, Bridgetown Barbados
afterGLOW Festival 2025, Dance Place, Washington D.C.
Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (Mass MoCA), activation of Jeffery Gibson's exhibition, POWER FULL BECAUSE WE'RE DIFFERENT, 2025
Research & Development
The question driving the project was- how can tracing spiritual foundations of NYC club culture reveal new ways to center the sacred through an ecstatic aesthetic? And, how are the ecstatic aesthetics of NYC club culture linked to Afro-Caribbean traditions of Carnival? Through a residence with New Waves Dance Institute, MX Oops collaborated with designer and Mas band leader Robert Young, wearing this banana leaf garment. Photographed by Arnaldo James near Port of Spain, Trinidad. Other shots are from Pitch Lake, the largest natural deposit of asphalt. The above video has a track by TR!GGERED and writing/vocals by MX Oops.
Footage from the Pitch Lake shoot was incorporated into an interactive VR piece by new media artist, Eva Davidova. This is one scene from Garden For Drowning Descendants.
The piece is experienced in a VR headset. Movements of the body affect motion of virtual projectiles and impact the water level.
Collaboration
UnFiNiShEd aNiMaL included collaboration with TR!GGERED (music composition, body building), Jason A. Rodriguez (choreography, dance), Monte Marin (music, vocal artist), Renée Alberts (poetry), Rodrigo Salles (hair, makeup), Eva Davidova (augmented reality), Sekou Luke (photography, video), Fabian Gomez (lighting design), Olubode Shawn Brown (collective advisor), Vincent Cacialano (dramaturg) and Thomas F. DeFrantz (research advisor).
A series of trips to the Domincan Republic brought the crew for filming and collaboration with Santo Domingo-based party, Queerium. The journey included yoga and meditation for the crew, developing a shared sense of the sacred.
Images and video from this journey were woven through the performance in the video design and also shared as an interactive audio-visual installation. This included custom neon signs, video, 40' image collage wallpaper, a 3'x6' lightbox, and augmented reality interactivity where still images in the wallpaper reveal hidden video through the use of Artivive app.
Party and Multimedia Performance
UnFiNiShEd aNiMaL premiered at New York Live Arts, April 22-24, 2024. The theater was transformed into a club with a bar, dj/lighting booth, two channel video with live feed, runway, and gogo blocks. The evening began with a live electronic music set by TR!GGERED, electro-acoustic live vocal performance by Monte Marin, original song by MX Oops, and vogue performance by Jason A. Rodriguez. Flowing back into a DJ set, the party people in attendance are given a bass-driven guided meditation, encouraging them to integrate the senses and enhance their sense of connection with each other.
The NYC premiere included an LSS section (Legends, Statements, and Stars) that invited members of the audience to walk the runway. Each night feature icons and legends from the Ballroom Community including Javier Madrid and Mother Tutu Louboutin.
Click here to view the video of the 1.5hr party and performance.
Click here to watch Bill T. Jones Interview MX Oops about the premiere.
A mixtape and preparatory guided meditation by MX Oops, as well as photos by Laura Bustillos and Jerry Cooper are included below.
Sound Bath, Dance Party, and Performance
MX Oops activated the exhibition POWER FULL BECAUSE WE'RE DIFFERENT by artist, Jeffrey Gibson in the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art's Building 5. The event began with a sound bath using crystal and metal singing bowl, gongs, and guided meditation. The second portion of the event moved to the other side of a large reflective wall for a dance and rap performance followed by a DJ set.
Gibson's exhibition feature garments, 5 channel audio-video, and several custom illuminated glass stages. Much of the audio and video is a collage from queer indigenous artists, building connection between generations of activism and creative productions.
MX Oops performed a solo version of UnFiNiShEd aNiMaL. Wearing new costume made in conversation with the exhibition, part of a fashion line in development, ECSTATIC AESTHETICS. At Mass MoCA, they also presented excerpts of new writing in development ECSTATIC AESTHETICS: Dancefloor Mysticism, a piece of writing in a series of recently published essays.
