The Act of Licking a Rolls-Royce in its Entirety
The act of licking a Rolls Royce in its entirety talkes about the objectification of desire. The work is a performance delivered as a video playable on any standard television or projection device.
The work utilises the medium of film and its embedded expectation of the sexualisation of content to stimulate the desire typical of advertising and mainstream cinema constructed through the “male gaze”.
Within this medium it constructs a mise-en-scene of a variety of obvious visual cues such as:
The work utilises the medium of film and its embedded expectation of the sexualisation of content to stimulate the desire typical of advertising and mainstream cinema constructed through the “male gaze”.
Within this medium it constructs a mise-en-scene of a variety of obvious visual cues such as:
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the female protagonist who is dressed as a “hostess” typically seen at functions for rich and powerful men,
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the convertible Rolls-Royce which is the pinnacle of luxury cars,
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the female draped around the car as is typical of luxury car shows; and
- the garage environment where women typically do not enter but where their presence is fetishised in mechanics’ calendars and pornographic films.
While licking is a sexual act and often implies subservience and degradation, it also, through the maternal licking of mother-to-child, implies nurture, care and protection. This confuses the traditional “madonna-whore” dichotomy used to categorise women in conventional media by presenting maternal tendencies in a peformance expected to be sexual.
The licking of the car in its entirety also empowers the artist with a form of ownership of it since in a kind of totemic way she has been able to take some of its power.
In this way, the piece inverts both the expected sexual dynamic of the female with the car and the dynamic of a sexually dressed female on film.
The purpose of the work is therefore to stimulate reflection around the unconscious expectations we have in relation to certain media and the participation of female bodies within them.
The licking of the car in its entirety also empowers the artist with a form of ownership of it since in a kind of totemic way she has been able to take some of its power.
In this way, the piece inverts both the expected sexual dynamic of the female with the car and the dynamic of a sexually dressed female on film.
The purpose of the work is therefore to stimulate reflection around the unconscious expectations we have in relation to certain media and the participation of female bodies within them.
2018
Video 24 minutes
Exhibited:
Video 24 minutes
Exhibited:
Zina Gallery - “CRASH” – 20.05.2022 – Cluj- Napoca, RO
Diehl Gallery at Night – 04.2019 – Berlin, DE
Atelier 35 - “Reputation matters” – 03.2019 – Bucharest, RO
Press:
https://madame.lefigaro.fr/evasion/bucarest-art-contemporain-de-surprendre-140819-166442
https://zinagallery.com/exhibition/crash/
https://www.modernism.ro/2019/03/08/shoptalk-with-ioana-sisea-reputation-matters-atelier-35-bucuresti/
https://www.observatorcultural.ro/articol/nu-ma-feresc-de-nici-un-cuvint-nu-mi-e-frica-de-nici-un-proiect/
https://adevarul.ro/stil-de-viata/cultura/reputatia-ioanei-sisea-salvata-de-o-prezentare-1932853.html
https://www.galerievolkerdiehl.com/exhibition/diehl_at_night_presents_two_videos_by_ioana_sisea
https://soundcloud.com/radioromaniainternational/reputatia-conteaza-de-ioana-sisea-la-atelier-35-interviu-cu-artista-plastica-ioana-sisea
