Transdimensional Multiversal Nonlinear Cosmic Traveler Exhibition by Michael Engebretson

Author: Interact Center
Published: 2023/02/03 - Updated: 2025/12/21
Publication Type: Event
Category Topic: Events - Public Notices - Related Publications

Page Content: Synopsis - Introduction - Main - Insights, Updates

Synopsis: This information documents an art exhibition that offers a meaningful window into how one Autistic artist imagines a radically different future. Michael Engebretson's work, displayed at Interact Gallery from March through April 2023, translates his vision of a "Class Five civilization" into concrete visual form - detailed drawings, paintings, and ceramics depicting advanced spacecraft, space stations, and an intergalactic society designed with equitable healthcare, economics, and support systems for all beings, including those with disabilities. The exhibition proves valuable because it demonstrates how artists from the disability community can use their practice to propose substantive alternatives to current social structures, making abstract concepts about accessibility and neurodiversity tangible for general audiences visiting the gallery - Disabled World (DW).

Introduction

Michael Engebretson's expansive drawings, paintings, and ceramics describe a futuristic, extraterrestrial utopia. Neurodiversity, sustainability, and equitable healthcare are celebrated in an intergalactic civilization he catalogs in hyper-detailed, graphic, technicolor works.

Main Content

"Transdimensional Multiversal Nonlinear Cosmic Traveler is an opportunity to have everybody in the community see what it's like to be me," says Engebretson.

"I want the public to see what it's like for somebody to have Autism like me and see what it's like to be able to travel to higher dimensions. My work is about what I call a Class Five civilization. Class Five inhabitants are transdimensional, multiversal, nonlinear space-time continuum thinkers. They are more free-thinking than we are. They are open-minded to any possibility, idea, conversation, and scenario. They have better health care, economics, and special support systems to help them out. They can help human-alien hybrids and cyborgs and robots with disabilities with specialized psychological and biological care that is designed for them."

Many geometric shapes are drawn within two larger, trapezoidal shapes. Patches of maroon, lime green, sky blue, and pink are painted throughout - Image courtesy of Bernie Wire, 2022.

Engebretson transforms Interact Gallery into a metaphorical spaceship, inviting visitors to immerse themselves in his visionary landscape. Kaleidoscopic drawings and paintings outline thorough plans for spaceship construction yards, hyper-giant space superstations, escape pods, asteroid bases, and the like. The space vessels he draws - and the ideology they represent - are the vehicles of a more equitable time and place. Engebretson offers these images not as speculative fiction but as kismet. He works ardently and without hesitation, transcribing a singular future.

About the Artist

Michael Engebretson (b. 1994) has practiced at Interact since 2016, but he was filling the pages of notebooks with futuristic scenes and building spaceships with K'Nex and Legos from an early age. Some of his longest-held aesthetic interests are science fiction movies like Star Trek and Star Wars, books on wormholes and celestial bodies, and schematics related to the multiverse. Engebretson is keenly perceptive. He notices the intricacies of the natural world, like the buzzing of hummingbird wings and the fractals made by trees. Animals deeply move him - toads are some of his favorites.

Engebretson identifies as Autistic and is an avid disability advocate. He uses his art practice to propose a future in which all beings are treated with respect. He has presented work at Art Enables (Washington, D.C.), Make Studio (Baltimore, MD), Gamut Gallery (Minneapolis, MN), and Interact Gallery. In 2021, Engebretson was a key contributing artist and performer in Zoomtopia, Interact's first virtual theater production and companion exhibition. In 2022, he was the inaugural artist in residence at Interact Gallery.

A photo of Michael Engebretson shows him standing in front of two of his pieces at Interact Gallery. He wears black-rimmed glasses and a turquoise pullover. He folds his arms and faces straight ahead. Sunlight pours into the space from the right, illuminating the vibrant colors of the works on the white wall behind him - Image courtesy of Bernie Wire, 2022.

What

Transdimensional Multiversal Nonlinear Cosmic Traveler

Where

Interact Gallery, 755 Prior Avenue North, Suite 002D (lower level).

When

March 1 - April 14, 2023. Opens Wednesday, March 1, 5-8 p.m. Free and open to the public (no appointment necessary). Remarks and artist reading at 6 p.m.

Accessibility

Interact Gallery is located on the lower level of a multi-unit building. There is elevator access through the main lobby.

COVID-19 Precautions

We ask that all visitors please wear a mask.

Insights, Analysis, and Developments

Editorial Note: What makes Engebretson's work particularly noteworthy is that he presents these visions not as escapist fantasy but as documentation of a genuine future he believes is achievable. His insistence on treating his drawings as "kismet" rather than speculation reflects a conviction that artistic practice itself can be a form of advocacy - not through sentiment or appeals to emotion, but through the sheer intellectual and technical rigor with which he constructs alternative social systems. For visitors navigating questions about disability representation in contemporary art, his work raises an essential question: what would change if we designed our institutions, economies, and support systems around the actual needs and perspectives of disabled people from the start? - Disabled World (DW).

Attribution/Source(s): This quality-reviewed publication was selected for publishing by the editors of Disabled World (DW) due to its relevance to the disability community. Originally authored by Interact Center and published on 2023/02/03, this content may have been edited for style, clarity, or brevity.