The FLOh!RA competition celebrates the award ceremony
Last Monday, the 25th of May, the award ceremony for the art science competition FLOh!RA was held at the UAB cinema. The initiative explored the changes experienced by plants through art.
Dr Kate Johnson, researcher Laura Wynne Stewart, and Dr David Chaparro hosted the FLOh!RA award ceremony last Monday. The 27 submitted works covered a wide variety of artistic formats, including poetry, short stories, drawings, paintings, photographs, songs, videos, sculptures, clothing, and mixed media pieces. The jury — made up of researcher Lucette Adet, artist Chiara Sgaramella, and communications officer José Luis Ordóñez — evaluated the works according to five criteria: originality, creativity and perspective, engagement with the theme “how plants change”, clarity of the idea, and emotional impact.
Laura Stewart and Kate Johnson present the second prize in the 19-35 category to Núria Milà Molist, for the work Quercus Nouveau, a dress designed by herself and inspired by the different phases of succession of a Mediterranean holm oak forest. Photo: J.Luis Ordóñez (CREAF).
From left to right, Laura Stewart, David Chaparro and Kate Johnson during the awards ceremony. Photo: Brad Johnson
All winning entries across the different categories received a notebook featuring drawings of Tasmanian nature by artists Jennifer Cossins and Tracy Colhoun, a magnifying glass, and guides to local trees and plants created by artist Anna Sanjuan. First-place winners in the 16–18, 19–35, and 36+ age categories also received a copy of Embolismo por soleá, a vinyl record by artist Paula Bruna inspired by the sounds produced in plant vascular tissues when the gap between available water and plant water demand becomes so great that embolisms occur.
After the award ceremony, attendees watched the documentary The Giants. The epic fight to save Australia’s Amazon. The film explores the environmental activism surrounding the forests of Lutruwita (Tasmania) through the figure of Bob Brown, a pioneer of many social struggles in Australia since the second half of the twentieth century.
The list of winning works in each category, as well as all participating entries, can be found on Floh!ra website.
The competition was funded by the European Commission through a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action, with support from CREAF.
