Desert Botanical Garden’s newest art exhibition opens January 2021 and features large-scale living sculptures created by Natasha Lisitsa and Daniel Schultz of Waterlily Pond Studio. Using florals and plant materials as the medium and desert elements as the inspiration, Wind, Earth and Water are three intricate installations that guests will experience at the Garden for only a few weeks. 

Wife-and-husband duo Natasha Lisitsa and Daniel Schultz work at the nexus of sculpture and floral art, creating installations that combine the emotion of flowers with fascinating structures of industrial materials. Their work has been commissioned by modern art museums, cathedrals, public spaces and cultural organizations globally.

The exhibition kicks off with Wind, which will be located in Stardust Foundation Plaza, Jan. 19 – Feb. 19. It is inspired by the tumultuous wind and dust storms that move across the desert landscape. Measuring in at 16 feet high and 8 feet wide, visitors can wander through the rings and gaze up at a “storm cloud” of plant materials, including cholla skeletons, yucca stocks, tree branches, tumbleweeds, and tropical bromeliad and heliconia. 

Visitors can experience Water in the Berlin Agave Yucca Forest on display Feb. 23 through March 22. This landscape intervention spans 100 feet, mapping the path of seasonal flooding through the site with 8,000 colored wooden dowels and 1,500 red flowering blooms, from petunias and geraniums to tropical flowers, oriented to flow and spill around rocks and plants. 

The exhibition will culminate with Earth in Dorrance Hall April 3 – 25, inspired by the sandstone strata of Arizona canyons. An immersive, room height 3-dimensional structure will be composed of 25 wood layers of “strata” cut away to reveal an open archway that visitors can enter. Ten thousand fresh flowers including roses, orchids and succulents will line the layers in a palette of desert colors.

Access to viewing Wind, Water and Earth is included with general Garden admission, but reservations are required in advance of visits.

About Natasha Lisitsa and Daniel Schultz

Natasha Lisitsa and Daniel Schultz, a wife and husband team, are internationally renowned floral installation artists. They are widely recognized for their larger-than-life installations, and unique approach combining flowers with structurally challenging forms.

Their studio, Waterlily Pond, based in San Francisco, California, has been commissioned by modern art museums, cathedrals, public spaces, and cultural organizations around the world to create large-scale floral art, with suspended installations up to 2000 pounds in weight. Natasha and Daniel have participated as featured artists in exhibitions in the USA and internationally, including at the de Young Museum in San Francisco, San Diego Museum of Art, World Flower Show in Japan, floral art exhibitions in Russia and Mexico, Festival Flora Spain where they won Grand prize, and Singapore Garden Festival, where they won Gold Medal and Best in Show. Natasha and Daniel’s work has been featured in numerous publications, including their own monograph Exuberant Floral Art published by Stichting Kunstboek in Belgium.

For more information, visit waterlilypond.com.