Client: Atlanta Botanical Garden

Overview

“Dream Flora”, a gigantic, immersive aerial art installation floating through the treetops at Atlanta’s Botanical Garden.

The exhibition featured a massive, custom-created “skynet” sculpture of streamers seemingly floating in the air above the Garden’s Storza Woods like a flock of multi-colored birds. The skynet was an experiential aerial installation by Patrick Shearn of Poetic Kinetics, known for its large-scale works of public art.

The 12,500-square-foot Skynet art piece ranged in width from five to 25 feet and in height from 12 to 40 feet. The design created a fanciful, almost lyrical, expression that playfully winds through the all-green tree canopy in all its brilliant colors, leading guests through Storza Woods to experience the garden in a fresh, unexpected way. 78,033 streamers danced through the treetops inviting wonder through their vibrancy.

“Dream Flora” was composed of red, orange, purple, and yellow nylon streamers attached to webs of nylon fishing nets that were suspended by ropes in the trees of the Garden. The installation extended to a Canopy Walk and suspension bridge where the kinetic sculpture glided through the air like a flock of birds.

Goals

The purpose of this kinetic installation came about in a time when the world was just waking up again out of its pandemic-ensured slumber. Atlanta Botanical Garden and Poetic Kinetics felt a cohesive need to bring people together safely after the season of hardship brought about by COVID-19. An outdoor, peaceful space like the garden adorned with joyful, expressive colors to bring whimsy and vitality back into the local landscape was the perfect solution.

Not only did “Dream Flora” bring the community together, it surpassed the Garden’s and the public’s expectations with flying colors. The installation exceeded pre-pandemic benchmarks, with the highest numbers of attendance the Garden had seen in years. The sculpture’s process from design to install succeeded against complications of designing an intricately woven and rigged piece without the ability to visit the site due to the pandemic which was a feat in itself. To exceed the Garden’s pre-pandemic attendance numbers by over 75,000 visitors in the midst of beginning to readjust back into the world, exhibited the majesty and power that color and art can have to unify the public.

Process

Atlanta’s “Dream Flora” is unique in that it is Shearn’s first skynet for a wooded area, which presents its own share of logistical challenges. His team does computer simulations to analyze the impact of wind in all directions, and in a wooded setting, the potential for interference is great, so the design is critical.

Because of the pandemic, traveling for an in-person site visit wasn’t feasible, so a local team created a 360-degree video along the skynet’s anticipated path and utilized 3D mapping to assist Poetic Kinetics’ team in designing the intricate piece from afar.

Another challenge was to install the skynet with minimal impact on the pristine nature of the setting, so Shearn hired a team of skilled arborists and trained them in the specific rigging needs for the installation.

“This is the most challenging installation we have taken on, but I feel totally confident that we can install something magical to complement the inherent beauty of the location,” Shearn said. “I hope that from it visitors will have a deeper appreciation of the forces of nature that flow all around us – that the observation and exploration of the natural world can be a wonderful experience worth pursuing and sharing.”