Keynote SpeakerMoon Ribas

Moon Ribas is a Catalan avant-garde artist and the world’s first cyborg woman. She best known for developing a 6th sense – the Seismic Sense, an online seismic sensor implanted in her feet that allows her to perceive earthquakes taking place anywhere on the planet through vibrations in real time. In order to share her experience, she then translates her seismic sense into music and dance. The implant also allows her to feel moonquakes, the seismic activity on the moon.

Moon Ribas grew up in Mataró, Catalonia and moved to England at the age of 18 where she studied experimental dance and graduated in choreography at Dartington College of Arts and Movement Research at SNDO Theaterschool in Amsterdam. During her studies she began to explore the possibilities of sensory extensions by applying technology to her body.

Since 2007 Moon has been experimenting with the union between technology and her body to explore the boundaries of perception and to experience movement in a deeper way. For her first experiment she created and wore a pair of kaleidoscopic glasses that only allowed her to see colour, no shape. In 2008, Moon created a speedometer glove that allowed her to perceive the exact speed of any movement around her through vibrations on her hand. By 2009, Moon was able to detect not only the exact speed of any person walking in front of her but also her own speed. This was the basis for her video dance “The Speeds of Europe” and the “Green Lights” choreography.

Together with Neil Harbisson she founded the Cyborg Foundation in 2010, an international organisation that encourages humans to become cyborgs and promotes cyborgism as an art movement. Moon also is the co-founder of the Transpecies Society, an association that gives voice to people with non-human identities and offers the development of new senses and organs in community.

Moon Ribas is a Sundance Festival Award winner and Co-winner of the Tribeca Branded Content Award.