ZAMARA ZAMARA

Collaborative creative response to a work in the Darebin Art Collection for ‘Assemblage’ (2021)

Rarohenga and Carried are positioned in ‘Assemblage’ in affirmation of each other, mirroring the reconnection the artists have felt to their practice through collaborative discourse mid lockdown. Sharman’s Rarohenga honors Daddy Mase, a dearly loved elder in the Naarm trans/queer community, the linocut carvings reflect aspects of the artists experiences at the time of Mase’s passing and of his legacy. Zamara’s Gestures series can be viewed as protective gargoyle-esk symbols, claiming space for rebellion and empathy. They are strongly informed by religion/mythologies and the desire to protect chosen family. Carried specifically, is a response to Rarohenga and accompanying discussions with Sharman. 

Collectively their works reflect on the forging of identity, of community projection, and of self-determined protections. They each feel courage through found histories, calling on miracles of cognitive structures and processes, unifying the uncanny and the emotional realities of experience. Interweaving mythologies with tangata, and threads of queer perseverance viewed through the landscape of lived experience, both Sharman and Zamara are encouraged and fortified in the connectivity of community.