Cam is currently a third year graduate student in the Art Therapy program at SAIC providing counseling services to survivors of domestic violence and their families. They work with a variety of materials in unpacking the pervasiveness of oppressive systems in their own lived experiences using writing, interactive performance, video, painting, and aquaponics. Their goal is to continue challenging the systems they work in through educating and collectively reimagining a liberatory future.
My work in the last decade has revolved around exploring and understanding my relationships with the bodymind, family, community, and the systems that hold space for these interactions. The project of “trans-natural” focuses on the accumulation of conversations, work, and research surrounding colonization, disability, immigration, queerness, and transness. With research alongside the lived experience of relationships with myself, friends, colleagues, instructors, environments, biological, and chosen families, trans-natural honors and celebrates transition, loss, and memory.
trans-nautral still image one This image is connected to the video trans-natural through the process of creating an aquaponic system.
trans-nautral still image two This image is connected to the video trans-natural through the process of creating an aquaponic system.trans-natural, January 2021, “trans-natural” explores identity, disability, and growth alongside the way western culture defines natural and unnatural. Some shots include the forests and waterways of Seven Lakes in New York state, an area shaped and groomed by man during the Great Depression. Other film includes aquaponic systems forged by the artist as part of their thesis. Together, the text and its background give the viewer a glimpse into the mind and experiences of the student. trans-natural transects time, space, gender, and questions the science of defining what natural really means.