Katrina Brook Flores aka El La Katrina is a Queer Indigenous Xicanx multi-practice artist born in Wisconsin with ancestral roots to South Texas, Mexico, Ireland and Senegal among others with an artistic focus on storytelling through filmmaking, installation, music, movement and wearable design. El La Katrina’s directorial and production design debut film, ASSAMAN, was finished in February 2022 as part of their 2020 & 2021 Dark Matter Residency with Elastic Arts Foundation. During the residency Flores also produced, wrote and starred in a virtual healing and hope sonic theater project entitled SEED POLLINATE BLOOM in Fall 2020 addressing the impact of COVID-19 and the Social Uprisings during that time on Black, Indigenous and Black Indigenous communities.

Flores’ work addresses boundary-spanning, border-crossing, and binary-breaking. They address how colonial systems, gendered constructs and conquer & divide tactics have impacted Indigenous communities and natural ecosystems globally. Their work seeks to offer solutions, healing and hope toward a future rooted in joy and ancestral teachings. El La Katrina was founding Arts-In-Education Director for OMAI & FirstWave and Co-Director of Breakin’ The Law: International Festival of Urban Movement at UW-Madison. After moving to Chicago, they served as Community Programs Director at RedMoon Theater and B-Series co-curator at The Dance Center at Columbia College in Chicago. Before becoming a full-time artist in 2019, El La Katrina worked as the COO of The Firehouse Community Arts Center in the North Lawndale neighborhood to assist in building the capacities of the organization in their inaugural year of funding with the Chicago CRED Program to achieve a transformative reduction in Chicago gun violence with justice involved youth. Following El La Katrina’s 2020 & 2021 Dark Matter Residency with Elastic Arts Foundation in Chicago, they now serve on the curatorial board for the Dark Matter Residency as well as The AfroFuturist Weekend Festival in Chicago.

Assaman is my directorial debut. More than a director, I am an author of story. I believe we tell the stories that are ours to tell. I tell stories that put ancestors and future ancestors in creative conversation. I pray I am honoring my ancestors in beginning my filmmaking journey through Assaman. I am committed to making films that remind people of their magic and that they're magic. That magic is both our humanity and our connection to the universal all. Having no formal training or education in film, my approach is that of an artist using film as a canvas to paint a story in motion. Mamadou Lamine "Tukkiman" Diao, my Cosmic Twin, is the sound to this story.