Creating a Floral Art Installation

 

Last Friday night I went out on a limb (good pun there!) and created an organic, whimsical, unexpected floral art installation for the Greenwood/Phinney Art Walk at Urban Light Studios. The back story is really pretty straight forward: I did wedding flowers for my dear friends Geoff and Carrie at ULS, the gals that run the space dug my designs and loved that I'm a local artisan and grower, we met and came up with this idea to get me some marketing exposure and them some added interest in the event space...done deal!

But what is really more mystical and slightly mind blowing (at least to me) is the process of actually getting to the point of creating this thing: coming up with the vision, planning it out, asking for help, trusting my skills, trusting that people wanted to see it...hell, actually calling myself an artist...this is all epic in the context of my growth as a designer and a human being. I engaged in probably 3 weeks of active creative thought, sketching, imagining, scoping out blooms and branches and budding things in my neighborhood...and about 5 days of incredibly challenging, anxiety-producing, yet fully blissful work to actually create the installation. Let me just say now, without the endlessly encouraging, pleasant, hard-working support of my mom, Molly, I would have crashed and burned on this project. Not because of any dire failing of vision or planning on my part, but because in any venture like this one, you just need help...it's just always freakin' true. On the morning of the show, I came down with a whopping head cold that left me in a FOG...and my mama pulled me through it with drugs, love and soup. And, she held the ladder...she held the SHIT outta' that ladder. Not only is that literally true, but is a figurative metaphor for how much she really did to help me with this show, from creating cocoon lanterns to sweeping up after me...I feel immense gratitude to know that she believes in me so much that she would dedicate so much to me...THANK YOU!

The Flying Bear Farm office, night before the show.

The Bower

My inspiration for the installation started with this time of year...the earliest buds on tree branches, forced bulbs in the garden stores, the tulips just beginning to push out of the ground in my garden, the very first plum blossoms, and a deep desire to see COLOR. After all that grey, white, brown, and evergreen around, a pop of magenta, cascade of saffron and streak of violet really speak to me! So the colors I settled on were a Bohemian mix of jewel tones and bright pastels with a weird splash of mustard yellow and pop of turquoise.

But deciding on colors wasn't helping me to create an actual art installation...What did that was two fold: a faerietale I told myself, and the bowerbird. I'll start with the faerietale...

There was a young man...a charming, dirty farm hand. He fell in love with a beautiful sylvan faerie he met in the woods beyond the farm. To show her his love, he created a wedding scene with all of the beauty he could find around him, on the farm and in the woods. When she saw what he had created, she fell in love with him, too...

 

And then there's the bowerbird, meticulously curating collections of beautiful objects to attract his beloved. Check out this video for the full story on this inspiring lover!

So I created an installation of collections, objects and flowers pulled together all for one imagined, overarching reason...to draw in the beloved! Flowers with intoxicating scents and bright, unexpected colors. Lanterns shaped like cocoons and tiny magical teepees to live in. An spell-binding bridal bouquet, complete with beets from the field, heavy with orchids, tulips, hyacinth and jasmine. Organic, gnarled, lichen-covered branches to get caught in. And a bower filled with precious piles of leaves, shells, rosehips, feathers and old tin cans filled with flowers.

The Bridal Bouquet...with beets!

I feel like this was a really successful event. Not only did I get to talk to great people about floral design (yay networking!), I also got to explore myself as an artist, put myself out into the Universe in a challenging and blissful way, and enjoy the hell outta myself while doing it! So, huzzah!! Thank you to all who came to be a part of this ephemeral event, and who supported me through the creative process. There will be more, much nicer photos soon, thanks to Katie, so keep an eye out for those! I can't wait to spread my wings again, as an artist and growing human being...xoxo!

With love,
~The Flying Bear