Story

My name is Alexandra Fedorova and Flow’rs is my soul project that was born in Amsterdam. Through my works I give life to wilting flowers: I capture their last moment of existence, their final breath, put it into a vintage frame and give you an opportunity to contemplate.

By moving to Amsterdam 4 years ago I felt unusual, a lot of conflicting feelings, on one hand, I felt joy from all new things, I was discovering new places, setting up our new apartment, but on the other hand, language barrier, no work and close friends around, no opportunities to meet someone I know or even to have a conversation.

To have a more comfortable life in the Netherlands, I had to invent my “stability rituals”. One of them - buying flowers for our apartment, a lot of flowers and putting them in different corners of the place. They bring the sense of lightness, freshness and, of course, make the space so gorgeous. 

But flowers have a way of fading and they do it so beautifully. This process helped to create  my new “flower tradition”: before throwing away old flowers, I put them into the sink and rinse off the pollen. It is like a ceremony of last ablution.
First there were peonies. As I put the bouquet in the sink to make my traditional ritual, I noticed how beautiful they were. There was almost nothing left from the flowers itself. Water washed away pollen and smashed all buds into petals. And this just blew my mind. I took my phone. Turned on the camera and took a few shots of this faded beauty.  A little bit of editing. And the pictures are on social media. Feedback I got to this shot amazed me - people admired how unusual the picture was, they put it as wallpaper to their phones, computers and also wanted to have it printed.

And I really liked this idea. So, the process of forming “ideal masterpiece” had started. I thought,  how exactly can I make this project unique? Choice of paper. Matte? Glossy? It was not enough. What else? Flowers remind me of Holland art. Then, canvas? Canvas instead of paper! And vintage frames, not custom-made , but found one flea markets in the Netherlands, Belgium and France. This will make every single picture special. There won’t be any other like this. And as well, museum glass, so there won’t be reflection which can distract you from contemplating.

Here it is! Ready! New life!