Using the nature/culture paradigm as a point of departure du Chatenier highlights the ironies of seeking an understanding of human subjectivity through comparisons to the natural world. These comparisons can become problematic in the Twenty First Century when our knowledge of nature is so informed by romantic desires for some type of authenticity.
This she has clearly illustrated in Pack, a series of photographs of her family and friends made up as dogs: “After nearly 9,000 years of strategic breed enhancement the domestic dog is a hybrid of organism and technology and a product of human desire. I like to think of my dog as a love machine. It is such an easy love to negotiate – easier than human love because it is so totally one sided. I know that there must be something in the human/dog relationship for the dog, but of course I can never really know what it might be. ”(du Chatenier 2001).
Du Chatenier uses a wide range of materials and processes. She employs highly theatrical devises such as installation, costume, photography, and sculpture to investigate the idea of identity as performative and a composite of both the real and the imaginary.