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Frozen Victorian Garments Arranged into a Larger than Life Bouquet by Nicole Dextras

Bouquet by Nicole Dextras is a composition of 15 frozen garments reminiscent of a floral arrangement, however the beauty is intended to be both enchanting and foreboding. The alluring collection of Victorian dresses was created to appear more like Venus flytraps rather than to reference romance, and speaks to mythical man-eating trees described in science fiction texts like J. W. Buel’s 1887 text Sea and Land. 

“Today we understand the use of symmetry and patterning in nature as a survival skill,” Dextras tells Colossal. “Birds and flowers in particular seem to go for the ‘big display’ to attract a mate and humans in our vanity, are susceptible to the same spell of wonder. This bouquet however was made with ice; it made its big splash in the wintery forest and within a few days it was gone.”

The collection of frozen garments was created over the course of several days during Dextras’s art residency at Banff Centre in Alberta, Canada. Dextras would spray the forms with water each night when temperatures were at their lowest to build up the right composition of icicles, and bond the garments into one large installation. Like many of her frozen installations, the work leaves no trace and is instead preserved as a subsequent photo series. You can find more of her work on her website, Facebook, and Instagram. (via Hi Fructose)