Just up the road from the Tate Britain on London’s Millbank sits a giant purple flower! Overlooking the Thames and sitting near to Vauxhall Bridge. It’s just the latest in a series of striking ‘Love and Peace’ sculptures popping up around the world from Croatian artist Ana Tzarev.
Titled ‘Peace’ it won’t be there forever. In fact it was placed in it’s current location on Riverside Park Gardens just after this years Chelsea Flower Show. It is mid way through a six month residency. Afterwards the four metre high fibreglass sculpture will no doubt move on to somewhere else. Taking its message of Peace with it.
Love and Peace Campaign by Ana Tzarev
And that is what really sits at the heart of these giant flowers. Those which have also previously resided in locations in Canary Wharf and Park Lane as well as in Prague, Venice, New York, Beijing and Singapore. According to Tzarev “my flowers act as beacons and rallying points across the planet – bringing people together on a global scale.”
It’s certainly a nice thought and reminiscent of the recent successful Art4Peace campaign from Peace charity International Alert. There the same was true. Use art to help start a conversation about something which can be shared and easily accessed. According to the Love & peace campaign “These flowers are universal travellers that remind their viewers of human similarities rather than the differences that so often divide the World”. It would seem that the tactic of using art as a means of helping promote peace is becoming an ever more popular one.
The ‘Love and Peace‘ campaign started in 2012 and features 15 works in total all of which will be circling the globe until 2017. ‘Peace’ the sculpture from Ana Tzarev will remain at the Riverside Park Gardens next to Vauxhall Bridge on Millbank until 25 January 2015. Inspiring City visited the sculpture on Saturday 11 October 2014.
Peace Sculpture Gallery
Giant Flowers Around the World (pictures courtesy of Love & Peace)
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