EA Sports’ latest addition of new content for FIFA 21’s VOLTA Football mode brings into focus its collaboration with Nowhere FC — the New York City-based street football club and creative team famous for its kits, artwork, and DIY ethos — with a digital clothing capsule dropping into the game that includes signature Nowhere FC pieces.

VOLTA Football, which first appeared in FIFA 20, was designed to celebrate the authentic culture, creativity, and style of small-sided football, while offering new ways to customize the in-game experience. To that end, the inclusion of Nowhere FC was an obvious choice. Celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, Nowhere FC was formed around New York City local leagues and sparked an early influence in the evolution of today’s independent football and creative scene from the streets to the internet.

In FIFA 21 VOLTA Football, players can test their skills to unlock items from the Nowhere FC collection. The Nowhere FC collection is available in FIFA 21 VOLTA Football for a limited time.

In addition to VOLTA Football, signature Nowhere FC items are also available in FIFA 21’s Ultimate Team, commonly known as FUT, which is the game’s most popular mode. In FUT 21, players can not only acquire Nowhere FC kits but also customize the stadium experience with Nowhere FC tifos to bring their supporters sections to life. 

Fly Nowhere has taken the discipline of kit design into experimental territory for its latest project, appearing at the 13th edition of the contemporary art biennial Manifesta Biennial — hosted this year in Marseille, France — having designed and produced a series of conceptual goalkeeper uniforms for an exhibition titled “The Keepers” by Russian artist Arseny Zhilyaev.

The installation presents fragments of a museum exhibition from a potential future, and Zhilyaev tapped Fly Nowhere to work on a costume display that commemorates a football match in a dystopian Marseille, with an imagined ultra-defensive version of the game featuring only goalkeepers, played between groups in social conflict — police, residents, activists, and artists. The photo shown here is from the first of four installations — the police, at Musée Grobet-Labadié. The displays are being hosted in prominent institutions around the city.

To complete the costumes, Fly Nowhere engaged Milan-based studio Phiware for Jacquard fabrics and Brooklyn-based goalkeeper equipment brand Storelli for components.

Fly Nowhere has worked with Italian football club Venezia FC to conceive VFC AiR, a first-of-its-kind artist residency program, with American footballer-turned-photographer Ethan White as its first resident artist.

VFC AiR has received international attention since its launch, and, as football-culture magazine Rivista Undici writes, “feeds the idea that Venezia FC is trying to be something more than a Serie B club.”

To see Ethan’s work this season, follow Venezia FC on Instagram at @veneziafc and search the hashtag #VFCAiR.

Venezia FC, the historic football club of Venice, Italy, has selected Fly Nowhere as its agency of record entering the 2020/21 season.

The Arancioneroverdi are led by American majority owner Duncan Niederauer, former CEO of the New York Stock Exchange, who took on the executive roles of President and CEO earlier this year, and has now selected Fly Nowhere to direct brand, marketing, creative, and merchandise strategy.

Earlier this month, the Venetians generated widespread buzz around their 2020/21 away kit launch, which was produced by Fly Nowhere.

Venezia FC are competing in Italy’s Serie B in the 2020/21 season. With their project renewed, their sights are set on Serie A, one of the biggest stages in world football.

Canadian superstar Jonathan David Jr. has selected Fly Nowhere as his marketing and creative agency following his record transfer to French Ligue 1 club Lille OSC.

Since 2019, David, 20, has won the 2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup Golden Ball; 2019 Canada Soccer Player of the Year; and 2019/20 Belgian league joint top scorer. In August 2020, Lille acquired David from Belgium’s KAA Gent in a record deal for a Canadian player.

Born in Brooklyn, raised in Port-au-Prince and Ottawa, David left North America to play in Europe at 18, making his professional debut with KAA Gent in August 2018. In his first two full seasons in Europe, David went on to scored 30 goals in 60 matches in the Belgian league and 7 goals in 17 matches in the UEFA Europa League. Since making his debut for Canada’s senior national team in September 2018, David has scored 11 goals in 12 international matches.

Fly Nowhere, working in collaboration with David’s football agency, Axía Sports Management, will direct marketing, media, and brand building for David, as he continues his rise to the highest level of the world’s game.