Pagan Promise of Spring

The series Pagan Promise of Spring consists of roadside flowers gathered from Salonen’s local surroundings (red clovers, everlasting peas, alfalfas, common chicories). The artist wove the flowers into wreaths and extracted their colours, leaving them pale and colourless. The distilled colour pigments were then conserved in transparent isomalt and displayed in laboratory glass vessels alongside the now-white wreaths.

Flower wreaths have long been used in pagan rituals across Europe. In Nordic and Germanic traditions, flower wreaths celebrated the cycle of the seasons and were used in honor of the return of the sun and the promise of spring.