Adeleine Daysor

This project examines the presence and encounter of painted objects by taking wallflowers as a metaphor of the everyday. Wallflowers are ubiquitous often overlooked, seen at a glance but only really discovered upon longer observation. We notice the everyday when things transform and seem strange, or are recognized as creative innovations. I extrapolate an “essence” of the everyday by expanding upon an interpretation of The Language of Flowers (a social practice and floral dictionary), interpreting theories of myth, strangeness, and technology with painted objects that include canvases, ceramic wares and architectural spaces. The myth of Rosa and Sub-rosa, Peranakan peonies, and an artifact nicknamed Narcissus are discussed in relation to the work of the artists Beatriz Milhazes, Lily van der Stokker and Francis Alÿs. The everyday is made up of a network of special and ordinary things¬—a perpetuating arabesque created through habit, intervention and social media. Painted objects, like wallflowers, are tactile placeholders and visual reminders of our constantly fluctuating familiar/unfamiliar and evolving everyday.