We are pleased to present Ditte Ejlerskov's fantastic "The Goddess Intaglio Prints". The images continue Ejlerskov's investigation of the happiness hormone oxytocin, which has been ongoing for a number of years. "The Goddess" as mentioned in the title of the works is the oxytocin goddess herself, who is in a constant battle with her nemesis, adrenaline.
Oxytocin is the so-called love hormone that the body is filled with during intimate moments, and for women also during childbirth and pregnancy. This happiness hormone cannot be present in the body at the same time as its opposite, the so-called “fight and flight” hormone adrenaline. The struggle between these two hormones – between love and aggression – has long interested Ditte Ejlerskov. In several exhibitions, she has explored the subject and, among other things, formed her own oxytocin cult that worships the oxytocin goddess.
The eternal wrestling match between the two hormones has been visualized in a series of both digital and physical sculptures depicting two athletic, naked female wrestlers. The motif is Ejlerskov's own variation on one of the most famous works of art in art history, "the Uffizi wrestlers", the ancient Greek marble sculpture depicting two male wrestlers that can be viewed at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.
These are the wrestling women found in “The Goddess Intaglio Prints”. From different angles we see their intimate struggle. But it is not two sexualized naked women that we follow, but the close combat of two avatars. The skin is built up from a network of threads and the eyes stare blankly ahead like robots.
Within the framework of "The Goddess Intaglio Prints" many pairs of opposites are accommodated: the digital technology with which the motif was produced, combined with the many-thousand-year-old sculptural template and the many-hundred-year-old printing technology; the eternal battle between happiness/oxytocin and anger/adrenaline; the contrast between the common image of the naked, exposed female body and the image we are presented here of the fighting, athletic avatar.
Ditte Ejlerskov has quickly reached a prominent position on the Nordic art scene. In 2009, she received her Master of Fine Arts from Malmö Art Academy and has since exhibited at art galleries and museums mostly around the Nordic region and Germany. Her work can be found in a number of important museum collections.
The prints were produced at Ateljé Larsen in Helsingborg, one of the Nordics' foremost workshops for intaglio printmaking. Each color is printed on thick cotton paper with a plate that is inked in by hand. The motifs are made in small editions of 30 prints.
