Burning Flower
video installation
MAT COLLISHAW
Biography
24.03.2020 – 06.04.2020
Burning Flower is an extraordinary virtual installation of an orchid sinking into darkness. It is simultaneously born and dies in a repetition of the flickering flames enveloping it, slowly oozing a brilliant blood-red elixir.
Seduction and destruction merge in an illusory perception, for the fire appears deadly yet attractive. At the forefront is a Victorian sensibility, in which base instincts lie just beneath the surface of propriety. Collishaw began creating photographs of enchanting yet tainted flowers in 2002, and since then they have become a recurring motif in his art. In Mat Collishaw’s work, visually seductive images symbolize desecrated beauty or forbidden pleasure.
