This series of Toquero’s Shock Machines functions as a critical re-contextualization of the Toquero's practice, a traditional activity within Mexico City's historic center. By presenting these devices, which are popularly used to manage stress, intoxication, or test an individual’s bravery through self-inflicted electric currents, the work aims to subvert and re-politicize their original function in a social ritual that is often accompanied by laughter and cheering from bystanders.
The dynamos and batteries, crafted from indigenous and colonized plants like oranges, peppers, and corn, serve as potent symbols of the deep-seated cultural shocks and violent processes of Portuguese and Hispanic colonization. The very act of generating electricity from these materials—a process often associated with progress and modernity—is re-framed to evoke the traumatic and enduring effects of colonial power structures. The experience is designed to not merely be artistic or sensory, but to activate a visceral understanding in the viewer of the historical traumas and ongoing power dynamics that have shaped the region. 
The work invites visitors to move beyond passive observation and into an embodied engagement with the historical experience of subjugation. By physically interacting with the devices, the viewer is positioned as an agent actively confronting a painful history. The act of self-inflicting a current—while referencing historical trauma—becomes a symbolic re-appropriation of power, transforming an instrument of control into a tool for understanding and defiance.

Three versions of the Toquero’s Shock Machines were exhibited:
I. Circuito Alameda, a solo exhibition held at Laboratorio Arte Alameda, Mexico, 2018
II. Factors 4.0 Bio Art - Art, Science and Technology Festival of Rio Grande do Sul, Labart/UFSM, Santa Maria, RS, 2017 and; Naturaleza Viva – BIENALSUR – Muntref Caseros, Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2017
III. 15th International Meeting of Art and Technology (#15.ART), National Museum of the Republic, Brasília, 2016