Probably, only few
women do not love flowers.
I am part of the majority: I simply
adore them. I love to be given flowers, and
whenI am not, I am capable of presenting
myself a small gift of my own. I can admire these surprising creations of
Nature for hours. It is certainly a miracle that such beauty arises from a
tiny sunflower seed, and just think of the variety of colors and forms. It is
interesting for what reason they were created by God? There, probably, exits
some very profound meaning... I have somewhere read, that flowers are actually
not creations of a terrestrial origin and that initially there were only
grasslike plants on Earth, while blossoming plants reached us with meteorites
from some distant galaxy.
Who knows? It may or may not be true, but I, for
one, am inclined to believe this story. It is sad to observe, how in your
hands or in a vase on a table these charming creations wither, losing their
freshness and beauty. At present there exist all possible sorts of additives
and solvents that render the lives of bouquets of real flowers two, three
times time longer. And even so such fowers will hardly retain their pleasant
freshness for more than two weeks. To be true, one can also buy, certainly
artificial flowers which are sometimes distinguished from real flowers with
difficulty. But the knowledge, that they are actually not alive, will always
irritate you. Compositions of dry flowers
decorated houses in the 19-th century, especially during winters, when there
were no live greens. By the beginning of the 20-th century, the interest in
such compositions decreased noticeably, and even ten years ago the choice of
dry plants was quite limited. Now much has changed - in large flower shops a
wide choice of various dry grasses and flowers is available. Now only two
things may be confusing. First, dry flowers do not exhibit the colours of
plants. This bias can be overcome if does not consider live and dry flowers
to be competitors, but allies exhibiting different properties in a sole
composition. The second bias is related to the feeling, that dry flowers are
uninteresting and lifeless. Such opinions may arise because most compositions
of dry flowers in shops and in homees represent bouquets with short stalks in
small woven baskets, in brown, golden and creamy tones. These compositions are
still called "hedgehog in a basket". This should not confuse you, because
such compositions have already become relics. With the aid of new methods for
drying plants and the interesting material, that is newly on sale, it is
possible to arrangee striking, bright, modern compositions. For example, from
dry flowers it is possible to
create bouquets
made of dried flowers and conserved grasses.
In creating a collection -Gallery 2 - I was guided by the sole desire to
prolong the beauty of fresh flowers, their
natural colours and forms. To this end many methods for drying and conserving
plants (for instance, live plants are sometimes conserved in solutions of
glycerine). By no means rejecting known technologies, I wish to illustrate, in
this collection, my method of drying flowers. It is quite laborious, since a
form is made for practically each flower in order to achieve the desired
result. In the pictures one really sees dry flowers with their natural
colours which remain intact for quite a long time, and they also retain their
natural form, which is important for creating a three-dimensional composition.
As to works made of leaves -Gallery 1, leaves' "skeletons" (sometimes termed
skeletonized leaves) have been known for quite a long time in floristics. But
such leaves have usually been applied in compositions only together with
flowers to render them more expressive. They are sold in large specialized
shops, but, unfortunately, the choice is very limited. And since I have
decided to create compositions only of leaves' skeletons, which requires
leaves of different sizes and forms, I have developed my own method for
cleaning the leaves.
How I have succeeded is up to you to judge.