Theo Ellison

Erotomania explores the elaborate courtship behaviour of bowerbirds in relation to artifice and display within image making.

The male bowerbird builds ornate installations made up of a variety of found objects with reflective, iridescent, or colourful surfaces such as beetle shells, flower petals, berries, and misplaced car keys to attract the female. They also employ optical illusions, placing themselves within false perspectives to appear larger.

The interplay between illusion and desire within human and animal behaviour, as well as the layered construction of virtual images forms a linkage with Lacan’s theories on desire and the specular image.

In 3D rendering, images are built up in layers, and the specular layer is fundamental in selling the illusion of reality to the viewer, mirroring the illusoriness of the bowerbirds’ visual signalling.

The more ordinary the bowerbird’s plumage, the showier their installations. In contrast with other birds, they have no perceived value other than these separate visual displays. The film isolates the bowerbirds away from their displays and the camera tracks over them like a continual vanitas or memento mori.

In looking at the behavioural aspects of image making through a biological lens, the relationship between the romanticism of the image and its deconstruction emerges.

Theo Ellison (London, 1990) lives and works in London. He graduated from the Royal College of Art in 2017 with an MA in Photography. He is interested in the behavioural underpinnings of art and its relationship to artifice and display. Art is conceived of in terms of the display, exhibition, or show, and his work looks to deconstruct and short-circuit these frameworks, though they can never be fully escaped. His work has been exhibited at Saatchi Gallery, London; Quad Gallery, Derby; and Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. In 2018 he was an artist-in-residence with the National Trust.