Petal World is Shia Yih Yiing’s second solo show with Shalini Ganendra Fine Art, and her sixth solo exhibition.  In this exhibition she presents a series of commemorative flower paintings as part of a larger installation that engages the viewer with image, word and participation.

The three large canvas works – Bloom I,II and III  – each measuring 250 x 200 cm in oil on unstretched canvas were executed in 2005 and form the basis for the development of this show.  Each  painting depicts flowers in full bloom against a white background, and each is titled with the date of a disaster.  These paintings are beautiful memorials, and use the symbolic resonances of flowers to allude to the events.

To these Shia has added a series of large watercolour works on specially selected and aged paper to produce an installation that uses this beauty and symbolism of flowers to instilll hope. The watercolours, Petal Worlds, use words to make blossoms, with the subtleness of the watercolour and paper like the repeated hope for peace.

There is also an interactive element to the installation, with the audience asked to add to the pages of Petal Worlds and to increase the radiation of the positive thoughts of peace and the interactive element is ” Blooming Pages”.  The audience becomes the  pollinator of these flowers entering the space of the Blossom Garden and spreading the hopes for peace that lie at the center of the concept.

If we repeat the phrase ‘petal world’ it transforms into ‘better world’. Shia’s primary intention with these works is to produce feelings of revitalisation, reinvigoration and hope.