Commissioned by The Artling for Capella Hotel’s McRae Bar, the illuminating floral artwork titled ‘Eternal Light’ by Don de L’Amour features atop Mark Douglass light pendants custom designed by BAR Studio. The installation was inspired by Founder and Creative Director Amy Thai’s travels, current life and desire to pause and reconnect with the essence of what matters. Hence, neutral hues of whites and its contemporary cloud-like forms were called for as emerging key movements to “intuitively flow”.
The starting point were the sculptural white accents of preserved hydrangeas, embedded with waves of tiki fern and cascading amaranthus. The neutrals are soft and sophisticated, with a soft finish illuminated by warm lights that exudes stillness and calm. For the colour palette, Amy expressed her love for white tones and its symbolic gestures of clouds and its soothing subtle textures. Whether it is escaping to the forest, nostalgic memories, or dreams of new beginnings, the installation and space is a refuge from the noise and clamour of modern life and an emphasis on how humanity and nature are inextricably linked. Amy draws inspiration from intuition and instinct and draws on her ancestral and cultural heritage, personal history, French art history, spirit and the cosmos to develop the work that seeks to engage humanity and nature. Put simply, her way of creating is about connecting into her emotions and responding to what feels right without hesitation. More so, the work is a result of an act of connecting and trusting something that guides her within without the need for her to fully understand it all.
Travel, principles of nature and French art deco with a modern twist shaped Amy’s choices of design. This particular work of floral designer and artist Amy Thai reminds us to slow down to take in the meditative down-to-earth array that is both peaceful and warm and draws on her experiences of living between many European cultures. Amy explains: “When creating this work and any other work, my intention is to lead the way without any intention which means trusting intuition and unconscious forces to guide it all.”
Investigating and discovering the multiplicity of self has remained a central focus in Thai’s practice. These nebulous yet mesmerising sculptural forms references the Western canons of classical art, while at the same time, pitches into something much deeper than what meets the eye - the concept of eternity. Her use of preserved hydrangeas, hanging amaranthus and tiki ferns marks the importance of life cycles and nature’s eternity. Such emphasis on florals amongst the illuminating lights marks the presence of the moment and meeting within that moment - indeed Amy believes that eternity isn’t anywhere else but here and now.
Photographed by Timothy Kaye
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