SNOWFALL: FLURRY

2015
Structural Installation
Client: Brookfield Properties
Location: Brookfield Place, Toronto
Role: Artist
Blackwell Engineering (engineer);
PVW Consultants (producer)

A 6000 sq.ft. sculptural installation consisting of 2000+ hanging, irridescent, and laser-cut snowflakes.

Summary

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Flurry is the third instalment in the ambitious series of seasonal art installations at Brookfield Place. The sculpture consists of over 2000 individual snowflakes snaking and billowing across over 6000 square feet of the Brookfield Place Concourse Level. Each snowflake is made of a prism-like material, changing colours as the viewer moves through the space and creating a shimmering glow.

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Like Frost and Gust upstairs, the design of each snowflake is inspired by Brookfield Place's iconic architecture, and highlights a conceptual connection between the fractal geometry of the building to that of trees and crystals in nature.

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Technical Details

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Flurry might be the largest application of magnetic paint in the world. To avoid leaving 2000 holes in the ceiling of the concourse, painting crews worked for two months to apply 18 layers of magnetic paint over 6000 square feet of ceiling. Each of the sculptures is then hung from a magnet hook.

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Each magnet is placed on the ceiling with a custom tool that was designed and 3D-printed by Studio F Minus.

To create a layout for the snowflakes that was naturalistic, Studio F Minus developed a custom software simulation of particles breezing through a 3D model of the space. This Java application allowed the artists to see how snowflakes would actually blow through the space at different wind speeds, and under other variable conditions. When the simulation produced an attractive gust pattern, the model was paused and exported to become the plan for the installation.