GAME ART: STEFFI FAIRCLOTH’S CORRIDO HERO (2022)

Steffi Faircloth’s Corrido Hero draws on the structure and format of the rhythm game Guitar Hero, which the artist frequently played during the 2000s. When the game launched in 2005, it offered a novel means of music discovery, introducing players to new genres through performative gameplay. In this intervention, Steffi Faircloth charts and performs Tres Veces Mojadoby Los Tigres del Norte, a corrido that remains largely absent from mainstream music platforms and video game culture.

The choice is rooted in both personal history and cultural omission. Corridos—i.e., Mexican narrative ballads often chronicling migration, resistance, and working-class life—rarely appear in global popular media, particularly within the framework of interactive entertainment. Faircloth’s mother had a personal connection to members of Los Tigres del Norte, one of the most influential norteño groups of the past fifty years. She even appeared briefly in the film Tres Veces Mojado (1987), which shares its title with the song and featured members of the band in leading roles. By incorporating this track into a rhythm game format, Faircloth not only pays homage to a genre underrepresented in digital culture but also embeds it into the algorithmic afterlife of gaming platforms, where it can circulate and be re-performed by others.

Steffi Faircloth (b. 1997) is a Mexican-American multimedia artist based in Phoenix, Arizona. She earned a BFA in photography from Arizona State University in 2019. Raised in Nogales, a border town straddling Arizona and Sonora, her practice engages the aesthetics and politics of everyday life in these liminal zones. Her work frequently employs humour and irony to reconsider cultural marginalisation, particularly the disconnect between popular media and border community experiences. Faircloth has exhibited nationally, including recent presentations at the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, the Tucson Museum of Art, and Chicano Park Museum.