Anya Galaccio

Anya Galaccio

Galaccio looks at decaying flowers - in large quantity they make an impact on the viewer as the scents are noticeable from when they are fresh and pleasant, to when they are rotting and smell awful.

Her work is interesting to me because it demonstrates how the beauty of nature is not forever and how we should cherish it whilst it is here.

I bought two kinds of flowers with the intention of using them in my sculpture piece whilst they were still alive - daffodils and tulips - unfortunately I did not leave myself the time to use them, and when I had returned to them a few days later, the tulips had wilted quite a bit. 

The daffodils had not opened when I bought them, meaning that whilst the tulips had wilted, the daffodils were fresh and vibrant when I returned to them. I decided to use the flowers as I had intended despite the wilting.

The wilting of the tulips meant that they framed the face of my mannequin, which I thought was lovely, despite it being completely accidental.

I can appreciate that the wilted flowers give a completely different piece than they would have done if they were alive, and pose a stark contrast that is much more interesting than if they were all completely healthy.

I feel that this partial decay relates nicely back to Galaccio's work, with an added twist.

To play further on the idea of nature entwined with the unnatural (real flowers in a plastic head - slightly ironic) I added artificial flowers in amongst the dead tulips to add volume and colour. 

To accentuate the surrealism and irony, I placed her outside amongst two leafy green bushes.

It became difficult to tell which flowers were real and which were artificial by looking at the photograph alone, which could be an argument against Galaccio's work, as my artificial flowers will not decay and thus argues that nature can be enjoyed permanently, supposedly making it less important.

I find it interesting that we are able to so successfully replicate nature, but still insist on acquiring live, real pieces of it for vanity or decoration, even if that means destroying it in the process. 

I later used the exact same flowers later to create this piece:

Inspired by Jess Riva Cooper's art and how she constructs nature over women's faces, suffocating the women's features as the nature seems to be growing out of control.

My effort is rather tame in comparison as I did not have enough flowers to flow overboard. But I enjoy the outcome regardless.

This image from the side is very interesting as you can no longer see her face and it seems that she has been engulfed.

I intentionally acquired a grey wig as I feel that a coloured wig would take away from the vibrant colours of the flowers. I also believe that if the skin was white instead of a peachy flesh tone, it would accentuate the natural colour even better. As demonstrated in one of my previous paintings:

The flowers are the focal point of the image as they beautifully contrast against the lack of colour.

I experimented with some photo editing to enhance certain colours and create contrast. Jess Riva Cooper's work is predominantly white, with splashes of natural colour. I feel that my photography mimics her work better with the added editing and creates an interesting image.