butterflies

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Art

Massive Butterflies Alight on Architecture in Larger-Than-Life Trompe L’oeil Murals by Mantra

In October 2020, a remarkable scene unfolded on the side of a building in the neighborhood of Jussieu in Versailles, France. Larger-than-life ladybug legs scurry along a stem, violet flowers blossom, and ornate butterflies perch on delicate petals. During the course of six days, the French street artist Mantra completed the painting “Là où fleurit l’émerveillement,” which translates to “where wonder flourishes,” using rollers and brushes to apply acrylic painting to the multistory residential building. In the neighborhood named for French botanist Bernard de Jussieu (1699-1777), the artist pays tribute to nature and local wildlife.

Known for his trompe l’oeil murals of butterflies encased in enormous specimen display boxes, his recent paintings, including “Three Butterflies for Lana” completed last month in Lana, Italy, take a wilder approach to the insects. Drawing on childhood memories of exploring wildlife near his family’s home, the new murals are composed from photographs the artist took in his mother’s garden in Lessy. Referencing the shallow depth of field captured with his camera, Mantra pays special attention to bokeh—faithfully recreating the blurry background that blends the work with the surrounding environment, highlighting the vibrant colors and varied patterns of petals, wings, and leaves.

You can find more of Mantra’s work on Instagram.

 

Art

Elaborately Layered Gardens by Ebony G. Patterson Hide Haunting Messages Within Dazzling Displays

Ebony G. Patterson’s multi-layered works are willfully superficial. The Jamaican artist weaves together a mélange of torn papers, tassels, appliqués, and feathered butterflies to create striking gardens replete with glitter and vibrant hues. “In many ways, I think of the work as the flower and the audience as the bees,” Patterson told Nasher Museum. “The bee is first attracted to the flower because of its color, but it’s not until you start peeling back the layers that you understand what’s happening with the nectar.”

Often set against wallpaper of her own design, Patterson’s mixed-media tapestries and smaller works are immersive and captivating, inviting study of both individual elements and how they interact. Hidden beneath the obvious allure of flora and fauna, though, are more complex, sinister messages of identity, violence, and death. Likened to “secret poisons,” these inferences relate to the anguish and perpetual mourning many women feel, and in her sprawling tapestry titled “the wailing…guides us home…and there is a bellying on the land…,” for example, feminine hands and limbs attempt to grasp for something beyond the entangled mass of jacquard and beads. “Each form bravely assumes a posture of distress, the onerous emotional and physical labor required to conduct acts of devotion, the soul care that grants permission to confront historic and inherited traumas,” a statement says.

Patterson lives and works between Kingston, Jamaica, and Chicago, and she’s included in multiple upcoming shows: What is Left Unspoken, Love opening on March 25 at the High Museum in Atlanta, a solo exhibition at Hales Gallery running from May 5 to June 18, and this November, at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. Until then, you can explore more of her elaborate works at moniquemeloche, where she’s represented.

 

Craft Design

Exquisite Hairpieces by Sakae Recreate Flowers and Butterflies with Resin and Wire

From liquid resin and thin strips of wire, Tokyo-based designer Sakae (previously) crafts delicate hairpieces known as kanzashi. The ornamental forms are often worn for special occasions and are realistic in shape and texture, with lustrous petals and wings in translucent shades that catch surrounding light. You can see more of Sakae’s hydrangeas, irises, and daffodils on Flickr and her site, and she auctions her pieces for buyers in Japan. Follow news about international releases on Facebook.

 

Photography Science

Exceptionally Slow-Motion Footage Documents Tropical Butterflies Bursting from Their Chrysalises and Taking Flight

In an extravagant display of evolutionary tricks and mating rituals, new footage by Adrian Smith of the wildly popular Ant Lab YouTube channel focuses on six tropical butterflies. The extremely slow-motion montage zeroes in on a trio of tropical creatures as they crack open and emerge from their chrysalises and others like the striking Blue Morpho as they take flight. Smith paired the spectacular clips with behind-the-scenes footage of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences Living Conservatory, which fosters a climate-controlled environment that hundreds of butterflies hatch from every few weeks. If you haven’t seen his previous footage yet, make sure you watch these moths and an unusual muppet-esque troupe as they lift off the ground. (via The Kids Should See This)

 

Art

Butterflies and Moths Flutter Through J.C. Fontanive’s Automated Flipbooks

Illustrations of the elegant atlas moth and paper kite and orange-barred sulphur butterflies fly through a new trio of analog animations by J.C. Fontanive. The Cleveland-born artist created a sleek flipbook machine while he was a student at the Royal College of Art back in 2004 and has since crafted myriad designs featuring birds and insects that fly around the small, metallic frame. His most recent works bring the 2D Lepidoptera to life as they burst into a flurry of quick movements, and the individual paper cards emit a subtle whirring, similar to that of fluttering wings. “Flipping pages make these handmade sculptures live in real sound and space. Creatures flit and flicker by to awaken the poetry of movement and inspire through nature and invention,” Fontanive says in a statement.

You can see the trio in action on Vimeo and shop available sculptures on the Flipbook Machine site. Follow the artist’s projects on Instagram.

 

Design

An Ornate Metallic Butterfly Hides Hundreds of Symbols in a Screenprint by Seb Lester

In his latest screenprint, artist, and calligrapher Seb Lester (previously) focuses on the Transcendentals: the virtues of truth, beauty, and goodness as they manifest to all living things. In the form of a butterfly, the work is filled with dozens of hidden symbols that dot the insect’s wings and abdomen, a mixture of order and chaos rendered in metallic ink. Lester shares about the piece:

It has been said that artists often seek to create order from chaos. Recent times have been nothing if not chaotic. In ‘Butterfly’ I’m trying to visualise a beautiful reconciliation, a balancing and harmonising of our currently fraught and destructive relationship with the flora and fauna of this beautiful and fragile planet.

“Butterfly” is available as a limited edition of 75 in Lester’s shop and is nearly sold out. You can follow more from the Lewes, England-based artist on Instagram.