One to Watch: Jennifer Latour’s Surreal Flower Sculptures

Jennifer Latour’s sculptures begin with living plants, but nature is only the first draft. The Vancouver-based artist takes flowers, branches and cacti apart, then rebuilds them into improbable hybrid species: lilies sprout legs, flowers bloom from other flowers and delicate stems hold entire miniature ecosystems in precarious balance.

Latour began developing the work during the first pandemic lockdown, drawing on more than 20 years in film makeup effects and a lifelong appetite for experimentation. Her sculptures now travel much farther than the small home workspace where many are assembled, via photos appearing in galleries and landscapes from London to Utah.

We spoke with Latour about recurring dreams, unruly flowers, the artistic benefits of Vancouver’s slower pace and the one natural force determined to ruin everything.

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How did you find your way into this work?

During lockdown, I was in survival mode and constantly trying little creative projects to calm my nervous system. Then I started having this recurring dream about giant flowers growing out of a field, with other flowers growing from their stems. By the fourth or fifth time, I thought, “I need to see if I can make that.”

I’d already been working with photography and makeup effects for film, so I was good with my hands and understood how things could be bonded or balanced. I started playing. It brought together my love of creature design, characters, architecture and nature. I posted one of the first pieces near the end of lockdown and it caught the attention of a gallery in London.

How does one of your sculptures actually come together?

The idea is usually very loose. It might start with a shape I see in a building, a strange plant or especially a tree.

I’ll take branches or flowers apart and rebuild them, making small holes in the main stem and balancing other flowers from it using small dowels. Sometimes everything has to be reconfigured because of the weight. There’s a lot of patience and a lot of things falling apart and being put back together.

Everything is alive when I make it. Once it’s finished, I photograph it. I like that play between photography, sculpture and painting.

Was there a piece that made you realize, “This is what my work is”?

My Shapeshifters series. I took a lily, flipped it upside down and gave it legs. I cut the stem and somehow it just stood there. It came alive.

That was the moment Alexander Calder met me, in my head. I imagined how he might have felt when he made his first mobile: you’ve done all this work and then suddenly one piece starts walking.

What’s harder about this work than it looks?

Things fall apart constantly, sometimes just as I’m about to take the photo. I can step on a creaky spot on the floor and suddenly the whole thing is done.

And then there’s weight and weather. Some flowers are too heavy to use the way I want to. The wind is my nemesis. It ruins everything.

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On My Mind

Obsessing Over: Alexander Calder.

Making: Shapeshifters.

Listening to: Slowdive.

Exploring: Living sculpture.

Visiting: Seaside towns.

Saving Up for: The Faroe Islands.

Design Philosophy: Less is more.

Personal Motto: “Stay curious.”

SEE MORE: Find Latour’s work at jenniferlatour.com, on Instagram at @bonjourlatour and through Open Doors Gallery.