CatharineClarkGallery

The Animal Crossdressing project grew out of a 5-week residency in summer 2001 at Caribbean Contemporary Arts (CCA) on the island of Trinidad. While visiting the Emperor Valley Zoo in Port of Spain one day, Katchadourian met the zoo keeper who was in charge of the snakes. She watched him feed and care for the snakes over several weeks, and over time saw many mice, rats, guinea pigs and even rabbits swallowed whole. Katchadourian never got entirely used to watching the feedings, and couldn't squelch her sentimental response to devise a scheme for some ways the prey animal could escape its fate. Port of Spain abounds with fabric stores, stocked with everything from staid grey cottons used for school uniforms to outrageous shimmery synthetics used to make costumes for Trinidad's famous Carnival. Given this strong cultural tradition of masquerade, Katchadourian decided to make an outfit for a rat that would disguise it as a snake. She found a stretchy nylon snakeskin print that was perfect for the task at hand, and also fashioned a costume that crossdressed the snake by using its body as the tail of an enormous, three foot-long stuffed rat.

The project was restaged in New York in 2002 with pet animals and documented in a more controlled studio environment using photography and video. It wasn't until she saw the video footage that Katchadourian realized how many transformations had come into play: the snake's body, lying inside the unzipped rat suit, looked like the intenstines of a giant rat. The predatory snake was suddenly both the prey and the guts ingesting the prey, all visible inside a huge gutted rodent that looked like it had just turned the tables on a snake and swallowed it whole.

Katchadourian handled the animals together with the pet's owners, and although the video emphasizes the awkwardness of dressing the animals, rest assured that neither snake nor rat were harmed during the making of this project.

The Animal Crossdressing project grew out of a 5-week residency in summer 2001 at Caribbean Contemporary Arts (CCA) on the island of Trinidad. While visiting the Emperor Valley Zoo in Port of Spain one day, Katchadourian met the zoo keeper who was in charge of the snakes. She watched him feed and care for the snakes over several weeks, and over time saw many mice, rats, guinea pigs and even rabbits swallowed whole. Katchadourian never got entirely used to watching the feedings, and couldn't squelch her sentimental response to devise a scheme for some ways the prey animal could escape its fate. Port of Spain abounds with fabric stores, stocked with everything from staid grey cottons used for school uniforms to outrageous shimmery synthetics used to make costumes for Trinidad's famous Carnival. Given this strong cultural tradition of masquerade, Katchadourian decided to make an outfit for a rat that would disguise it as a snake. She found a stretchy nylon snakeskin print that was perfect for the task at hand, and also fashioned a costume that crossdressed the snake by using its body as the tail of an enormous, three foot-long stuffed rat.

The project was restaged in New York in 2002 with pet animals and documented in a more controlled studio environment using photography and video. It wasn't until she saw the video footage that Katchadourian realized how many transformations had come into play: the snake's body, lying inside the unzipped rat suit, looked like the intenstines of a giant rat. The predatory snake was suddenly both the prey and the guts ingesting the prey, all visible inside a huge gutted rodent that looked like it had just turned the tables on a snake and swallowed it whole.

Katchadourian handled the animals together with the pet's owners, and although the video emphasizes the awkwardness of dressing the animals, rest assured that neither snake nor rat were harmed during the making of this project.

The Mended Spiderweb series came about during a six-week period in June and July in 1998 which Katchadourian spent on Pörtö. In the forest and around the house where Katchadourian was living, she searched for broken spiderwebs which the artist repaired using red sewing thread.  All of the patches were made by inserting segments one at a time directly into the web. Sometimes the thread was starched, which made it stiffer and easier to work with. The short threads were held in place by the stickiness of the spider web itself; longer threads were reinforced by dipping the tips into white glue. She fixed the holes in the web until it was fully repaired, or until it could no longer bear the weight of the thread.  In the process, I often caused further damage when the tweezers got tangled in the web or when my hands brushed up against it by accident.

The morning after the first patch job, Katchadourian discovered a pile of red threads lying on the ground below the web. At first she assumed the wind had blown them out; on closer inspection it became clear that the spider had repaired the web to perfect condition using its own methods, throwing the threads out in the process. My repairs were always rejected by the spider and discarded, usually during the course of the night, even in webs which looked abandoned. The larger, more complicated patches where the threads were held together with glue often retained their form after being thrown out, although in a somewhat "wilted" condition without the rest of the web to suspend and stretch them. 

A video called GIFT/GIFT was part of the suite of works as well.

Mystic Shark was shot in a hotel room in Mystic, CT, using a box of petrified teeth bought at the Mystic Seaport Museums gift shop. Mystic Shark tries to elicit sympathy through the awkward and sentimental anthropomorphism of this much-feared and almost mythically vicious creature. What is shown here might be a "behind the scenes" moment where the tough guy shark gets ready to do his job (maybe he works at the aquarium being a shark in a tank, but lives in a hotel down the road). He's a bit past his prime, but he is trying to live up to our expectations. In the end, he tries to look endearing, and implores us silently to just try to love him a little bit.

One summer, Katchadourian watched a group of caterpillar eating a birch tree right outside her door. She thought a pair of them would make a perfect mustache. It was a difficult photo shoot, since they kept trying to crawl up her nose and also had trouble sticking to her face. Applying honey to her upper lip (Katchadourian's mother's suggestion) helped a great deal. Crossdressing, an act that is generally thought of as a highly unnatural act, transpires here using entirely natural materials.

One summer, Katchadourian watched a group of caterpillar eating a birch tree right outside her door. She thought a pair of them would make a perfect mustache. It was a difficult photo shoot, since they kept trying to crawl up her nose and also had trouble sticking to her face. Applying honey to her upper lip (Katchadourian's mother's suggestion) helped a great deal. Crossdressing, an act that is generally thought of as a highly unnatural act, transpires here using entirely natural materials.

One summer, Katchadourian watched a group of caterpillar eating a birch tree right outside her door. She thought a pair of them would make a perfect mustache. It was a difficult photo shoot, since they kept trying to crawl up her nose and also had trouble sticking to her face. Applying honey to her upper lip (Katchadourian's mother's suggestion) helped a great deal. Crossdressing, an act that is generally thought of as a highly unnatural act, transpires here using entirely natural materials.