The Installation

For the installation of Pedalphilia, I aimed to produce a well-crafted and highly detailed representation of a store-like display for my Merry Saddles™ fine art products. The gallery became a hybrid space of commercialism and fine art. Immediate influences were those artists who also played with the boundaries of “product” as art, namely Marcel Duchamp and his ambiguous readymades, Claes Oldenberg’s clever store on Second Street, and Andy Warhol’s slick appropriations of commercial designs.

To take the bicycles out of the garage and into the gallery, I contracted the construction of four large white platforms. Conforming to the traditional role of the pedestal, these platforms literally and figuratively elevated the bedroom bicycles to a showroom/fine art status. The solo saddles were mounted to custom-built seat post stands and arranged on a set of two tall white pedestals. Three saddles — Blue Swirl, Fist of Fury, and Wild Ride — were arranged on one wide pedestal while Rough Rider held its own on a separate structure.

Recognizing color and/or theme relationships between the two and three-dimensional works, I arranged them within the gallery to create a certain flow, one which echoed the flow of desire mentioned previously. The fairy-tale innocence coupled with the provocative nature of both Beauty and the Bike and The Dirty Rose complemented one another, while the sultry Felicienne la Coquette emitted the same allure as the Girl Meets Bike artist book. To induce a teasing curiosity about the two artist books, I digitally enlarged and printed one page from each volume on a HP Designjet 5000™. These large format giclée prints were then hung on the wall near their corresponding artist books.