3 September - 27 October
Ella Fleck
Nolan Park House 17
Governors Island, NY, USA
For enquiries contact: jpb@grove.biz
Ella Fleck, Daygame, 2024,
Pocket motorbike, live camera, tank filled with dilution of
5a-androst-16-en-3-one 20mg concentrate (mating pheromone
found in the saliva, urine, sweat and semen of male humans and male pigs),
keys and keychains,
30 x 35 x 20 inches (76.20 x 88.90 x 50.80 cm)
Artist Statement
Daygame (2024) considers the psychical significance of “masculinity,” connecting materials ofinfantilization, social control and mechanisation.The phrase “psychic significance” originates with Australian theorist Elizabeth Grosz, used toexamine how objects and architectures project ideologies of bodies into space. It suggests a way ofcommunicating structures and systems that is non-verbal, and instead encoded or embodied ortransmitted. It is a passive yet physically aggressive mode.The pheromone used in the fuel tank of the bike is Androstenone, a molecule worn by ‘day-gamers’and pick-up artists with the intent of projecting or asserting an aura of dominance, sexual aggression,or attraction. It is also used by farmers in pig breeding to prepare female pigs for insemination. It isnaturally occuring in the semen, sweat and saliva of human men and pigs.The “pocket bike” is a motor bike designed for children that is modified illegally by adult ‘mini moto’racers. It’s finished in silver chrome which is an evasive/reflective colour. The camera remains activeby way of battery power and is recording the room. The rather menacing position stands inopposition to its size, implying the performance of an innocuousness/innocence, a lá the “manchild.”More obliquely, the keyring is an ex libris from Freud’s book Oedipus & the Sphinx, while the artistinverts a reference from Francis Picabia’s drawing “Portrait of a Young American Girl in the State ofNudity” that connect mechanisation and gender.
Pocket motorbike, live camera, tank filled with dilution of
5a-androst-16-en-3-one 20mg concentrate (mating pheromone
found in the saliva, urine, sweat and semen of male humans and male pigs),
keys and keychains,
30 x 35 x 20 inches (76.20 x 88.90 x 50.80 cm)
Artist Statement
Daygame (2024) considers the psychical significance of “masculinity,” connecting materials ofinfantilization, social control and mechanisation.The phrase “psychic significance” originates with Australian theorist Elizabeth Grosz, used toexamine how objects and architectures project ideologies of bodies into space. It suggests a way ofcommunicating structures and systems that is non-verbal, and instead encoded or embodied ortransmitted. It is a passive yet physically aggressive mode.The pheromone used in the fuel tank of the bike is Androstenone, a molecule worn by ‘day-gamers’and pick-up artists with the intent of projecting or asserting an aura of dominance, sexual aggression,or attraction. It is also used by farmers in pig breeding to prepare female pigs for insemination. It isnaturally occuring in the semen, sweat and saliva of human men and pigs.The “pocket bike” is a motor bike designed for children that is modified illegally by adult ‘mini moto’racers. It’s finished in silver chrome which is an evasive/reflective colour. The camera remains activeby way of battery power and is recording the room. The rather menacing position stands inopposition to its size, implying the performance of an innocuousness/innocence, a lá the “manchild.”More obliquely, the keyring is an ex libris from Freud’s book Oedipus & the Sphinx, while the artistinverts a reference from Francis Picabia’s drawing “Portrait of a Young American Girl in the State ofNudity” that connect mechanisation and gender.