Transmutation – A Public Demonstration (2018)
“Personally, I think it makes a very lovely transmutation.”
Miss Rose, The Wicker Man (1973)
A change of species, state of being or identity. Transmutation blurs the boundaries between gender, creation, destruction and the human need to procreate and attach personality to the inanimate. Through the viscera, scrubbing, surgical spirit and stitching new beings come into existence. Not by means of biology, but rather through intention, invention and a strong stomach.
Exhibition Notes – 15/06-23/06
Commissioned by Vivid Projects for Her Horror
Opening night – Makeup by Amber Cadaverous
Photographs by Ollie MacDonald-Brown
Creatures
Photographs by Alex Billingham
Closing event – Costume by Dean Karl Wellings
Photographs by Alex Billingham
A Note On Subjects
All the subjects of this demonstration were bought as pet food. These ‘Feeder’ animals are, by necessity, bred in clean conditions and killed by Co2 inhalation, a method which sedates then kills the animal. By my methods of preservation I aim to celebrate the creature’s life and mythologise its future.
Vicky Roden 