In April 2015, FLUX debuted its latest sculpture, Bloom!, at the “Second Nature: Junk Rethunk” exhibition at the Philadelphia Zoo. 

 

Situated at the entrance of this cutting-edge zoo, Bloom! is an outrageous arrangement of flowers and butterflies that creates a fun and inviting installation to greet visitors over the course of the seven-month show. It produces both light and shade with a swirl of mixed recycled materials anchored by over-sized leafy stems and a wide base. As the preferred food of young Monarch Butterflies is threatened by climate-change and development. The sculpture shows their plight with 9 oversized butterflies flying amongst flowers they cannot eat. Together with the butterflies, the sculpture consists of forty-five flowers all created from largely from recycled parts — car hoods, trunks, tires, traffic-light lenses, bumpers and other assorted scrap. The structure is composed entirely of steel re-purposed from a retired sculpture created in 2011. With Bloom!, visitors to the zoo will explore the connections between our natural environment and the materials, technology and human actions that threaten it.