Flaming Lotus Girls
Flaming Lotus Girls is a volunteer-based group of artists who make large-scale kinetic fire art. The group began in 2000, in San Francisco, California, as a group of six women and two men who wanted to gain the fabrication skills and design experience needed to create large sculptural installations. The group now includes over 100 members. Over half are women; all genders are welcome.
Art
Tympani Lambada (2011)
Tympani Lambada is a sculptural representation of the inner ear.
Soma (2009)
Soma is a stainless steel neuron, and illustrates flowing electricity through crowd-controlled LED light patterns that shoot along its dendrites and axon.
Mutopia (2008)
Mutopia is a spiraling sculpture of "seedpods," laid out according to the Golden Ratio, a proportion found throughout art and nature.
The Serpent Mother (2006)
The Serpent Mother is a 168-foot-long (51 m) sculpture of a skeletal serpent coiled around her egg.
The Angel of the Apocalypse (2005)
This elegant sculpture, originally built of steel, driftwood and fire systems, rises from the earth in the form of an abstracted bird. The Angel's wings burn continuously with ambient flame, and each feather features audience-controlled "poofer" fire effects.
Its head, formed from curved steel plate and featuring hand-blown glass eyes, stands 20 feet (6.1 m) tall and functions as a wood burning fireplace. Participants are invited to move around and between the Angel's feathers, and to climb and sit atop its driftwood torso.
During its debut appearance at Burning Man, the driftwood torso was burnt as part of the performance. A new steel one was designed and constructed in the winter of 2009-2010, to bring to Toronto's Winter Festival.
The Seven Sisters (2004)
A collection of seven sculptures approximately 15 feet (4.6 m) in height, representing the stars of the Pleiades constellation. The Seven Sisters include:
- Alcyone
- Celano
- Maia
- Taygeta
- Asterope
- Merope
- Electra
A Merope rebuild was completed in March 2012, and features CNC plasma-cut stainless steel sides.
The Hand of God (2003)
Hand of God: A 12-foot (3.7 m) copper sculpture of a woman's hand that shoots flame from all five fingers.
Fire Fan (2002)
Huge plumes of liquid fire controlled by MIDI.
Fire Island (2002)
Interactive Flaming Flowers, cacti, arbors and more.
Flaming Flower Garden (2001)
A garden of fire, including copper flowers, a lily pond, and a weeping willow.
Flaming Lotus Sr. (2000)
A sculptural flame thrower.
Film
The Flaming Lotus Girls were featured in Dust & Illusions,[1] a documentary about the whole history of Burning Man. Pouneh Mortazavi, Rebecca Anders, Rosa Anna DeFilippis, Caroline Miller, Charlie Gadeken and James Stauffer were the Flaming Lotus Girls' members interviewed for the film. The footage features the Serpent Mother.
External links
References
- ↑ Olivier, Bonin (March 2009). "Dust & Illusions. Documentary on 30 Years of Burning Man history".
The 90 minutes long documentary features the Flaming Lotus in a 15 minutes segment.