In his videos, performances, and assemblage, Tara Mateik casts himself as theoretical and cultural transvestites from media culture, competitive sport, and weird science. Rather than passive recreations of the past, these reenactments serve as political interventions into our understanding of history. His work has been exhibited at MoMA PS1, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Dixon Place, The Kitchen, Participant Inc., Reena Spaulings, Aurora Pictures (Houston), and the Oberhausen Short Film Festival (Germany). Mateik’s videos are distributed by Video Data Bank.
While at MacDowell, Tara created new installations for Friends of Dorothy (Judy Garland Screen Test): one from the film Valley of the Dolls, the other, from Judy Garland’s April 23, 1961 concert at Carnegie Hall. He received Creative Capital (2008) and Franklin Furnace (2013-2014) grants for the multimedia project There's No Place, an ongoing intervention into the transfeminist legacy of Oz, to which his work at MacDowell contributes.
