Commissioned and Collaborative Arts Practice > Chimera Collaboration (Vanessa Godden + Melissa Tran)

Untitled
Digital inkjet photograph
2014
Untitled
Digital inkjet photograph
2014
Untitled
Digital inkjet photograph, shag rug, air plant wrapped in a 'flesh toned' stocking
2014
Untitled
Digital inkjet photograph
2014
Scale
Video, 'flesh toned' pantyhose sewn together, astroturf
1 min 25 secs
2014
Telophase
Video, pomegranate (whole and single seeds)
5 mins 18 secs
2014
Mercury
Single Channel HD Video, liquid make-up foundation, mirror frame
2012
Mule
Single Channel HD Video, 'flesh toned' house paint swatches made into thaumatropes
2012
Meiosis
Single Channel HD Video, house paint made to match each of our flesh tones, paint bucket, wooden paint stirrer
2012
Siren
Single Channel HD Video, house paint mixed to match each of our skin tones, hair
2012
Dry/Barren
Single Channel HD Video, house paint mixed to match each of our skin tones
2012
The Great Divide
Single Channel HD Video, ice cream, straws
2012
Reverse Siamese
Single Channel HD Video, white fabric, safety pins
2012
Blinders
Single Channel HD Video, inkjet prints of parts of our faces stitched together with needle and thread, brown stocking
2012

Chimera Collaboration is comprised of artists Melissa Tran and Vanessa Godden. Ideals of femme and racicalised identities imposed on them from each of their contrasting multiracial identities are the catalyst for their collective endeavours. Their collaborative process explores themes of racial ambiguity and hyper-sexualization through the use of blending, disconnecting, and reflection. Chimera Collaboration manipulates and exaggerates ablutions, adornments, and dinging practices to exploit domestic landscapes into unfamiliar settings through a series of performative photographs and videos. Utilising the physicality of their bodies with materials such as colour swatches, latex paint, foundation makeup, manipulated photographs, white sheeting, nylon tights, pomegranates, and ice cream, Tran and Godden address the divergent constitution of their cultural, gender, and sexual identities in a society fixated on the body's capacity to be consumed through reductive methods of perception.