A rat scurries across your path as you walk out of the subway station at night. A cockroach emerges from underneath your bathroom sink when you go to brush your teeth. A flock of pigeons descend upon your cracked-open window.

Did you feel yourself squirm when you read these statements? Did your eyebrows rise, your nose wrinkle, your stomach churn?

In June, Chimeras Collective wrapped up a seminar at the Strother School of Radical Attention, CREATURES, in which we asked these exact questions. By studying rats, pigeons, and cockroaches, we explored how disgust colors our relationship to urban creatures. Attention, here, allows us to examine why we tend to be disgusted by urban pests — and whether we can turn said disgust into fascination.

Mythology is full of monsters. Grotesque beasts, monstrous spirits, giant creatures wreaking havoc on the humble folk trying to make their life on the land. It seems humans of disparate origins share some inherent preoccupation with such monsters. One such was described by Homer in the Iliad: "she was of divine stock not of men, in the fore part a lion, in the hinder a serpent, and in the midst a goat, breathing forth in terrible wise the might of blazing fire." Thus, the chimera was born (or, at least, described). Like many of our mythological monsters, she is a vulgar being, forged of some unnatural union between creatures that should never intermix. Or so we might think.

In the millenia since the birth of the chimera, the term has taken on new meanings, across mythology, literature, and biology to more abstractly describe a hybrid creature. But it still retains some of the mysticism of its origins – the fire-breathing lion/serpent/goat conjured to strike fear into the hearts of men. A term rich with layered meanings, the chimera always hints and something deeper to be excavated. How does the chimera come to be? In what ways do its distinctive parts work together? And why is our primary reaction to the chimera so often disgust or horror?

We’re growing the Chimeras Collective, motivated by these questions. We believe that exploring mythology – the stories we tell ourselves during a particular time period – goes hand in hand with exploring science – the ways we answer questions about how meaning is made and molded – and exploring embodiment – how understanding happens through the sensory body instead of the mind. Somewhere within the triangulation of science, art, and technology, our chimeric spaces ask: Can science be embodied? Can wonder be a practice? Can creatures be collaborators?