Art is flowering

Lovely Flowers
Gold flower jewellery from ancient Greece, Baroque flower brooches richly set with precious stones and extravagant Jugen dstil/ Art Nouveau flower motifs, for example from the hand of René Lalique, demonstrate the widely varying approaches goldsmiths have taken to the subject down through history.
Pieces of contemporary art jewellery also reveal a variety of models and sources of inspiration – be they nature directly reproduced, literary models or synonymous with an attitude to life – artists such
as Gijs Bakker, Bettina Speckner, Wolli Lieglein, Katja Prins and Helen Britton all have different takes on flowers and have translated them into jewellery so that the centuries-old history of the motif has gained entirely new qualities in the midst of diversity. Never before in the history of jewellery has the subject of blossoms, plants and nature been represented in jewellery so excitingly and with such sophistication.

Floral Motifs in the Visual Arts
The exhibition ranges widely over the visual arts – from drawings from nature through photography and installation to video documentaries. Some of the in - dividual projects have been conceived
specially for »Art is Flowering«.
In photographs in large formats, Nathalia Edenmont from Stockholm has captured flowers with egg-yolk inflorescence and leaves composed of butterfly wings, which arouse a vague uneasiness despite, or perhaps due to, their saturated hues. A floral installation crocheted in many individual parts by Katie Holten stands for trips taken by the Irish artist and is indeed a piece of crocheted life.
Visitors are included in the interactive table installation by Keiko Takahashi from Japan: by placing objects on a table and moving them around, they create a small world transformed by communication.
The video work »The 4 Seasons of Veronica Read« by the Turkish artist Kutlug Ataman, which debuted 2002 at the documenta 11, is the portrait of a woman and her obsession with the Amaryllis.