LENA LONG/ Good behaviour

Good Behaviour. On the floor, a drop of milk glistens, protruding and rejoicing in a relentless limbo: ODOURLESS, FROZEN, NO NUTRIENTS, NO PROTEIN NOR CALCIUM, AND MUCH LESS BREASTMILK, covered by a CLINICAL WHITE FILM — a nourishing milk that doesn't feed. The artworks are authored by Lena Long. Some of them exhibit a few discreet trinkets, standing as subtle symbols more than actual clutter. In her practice, painting almost seems to stand for sculpture (or the other way around) as a carefully picked medium that rarely gives birth to a series but serves as a common thread, an overarching theme that bonds the pieces together. It sometimes becomes a backdrop, a theatre flat: a wood-painted trompe l’oeil barricade prevents the half-alive foal from escaping its gleaming pen. L for Loser, once a grounded pedestal, recalls the emotional security that geometric and symmetrical shapes can provide. Its surface, made of linoleum and oak veneer, bestows illusion but never releases the same scent — one we might mistake for sap and myrrh. I turn my head away, Dolly123 stands still in the corner of the room. She’s wearing grey leopard socks, all wrapped in polyester. Her gaze is empty, but her studded bracelet tries to tell us something: that she belongs to a special aesthetic or emotional category. She’s a young teenager with character. I move around her to see what she is concealing from behind: just as I thought, her hair is braided with a ribbon. When I couldn't imagine a more fitting coincidence, a song by Patience & Prudence echoes in the half-empty space. Dolly won’t ever honor us with a smile. ...So I'll be special and I'll be rare. I'll be something beyond compare. I'll be noticed because I'll wear a smile and a ribbon in my hair. —Emma Bombail