Gem

Fresh flowers from artist Portia Munson’s garden, bloom larger than life at the Albany Airport in upstate New York. Munson’s Catskills farm doubles as her studio and canvas, where she cultivates her extraordinary environmental works. Her creative process begins in the garden, where she grows a variety of flowers. Following an afternoon of selecting and cutting her floral subjects, her next stop is to arrange and custom cut them to create beautiful mandalas, which in turn are digitally copied and printed onto massive banners, which delight passengers and crews alike travelling through the flight terminal.

Air Garden is the title of a piece literally hanging below skylights at LAX. The massive work was imagined by the Los Angeles based design team of Benjamin Ball and Gaston Nogues. Inspired in part by the renaissance cathedrals of Europe, they’ve created a multi-coloured, hand beaded, visual kaleidoscope that interacts with sun light to create a constantly evolving visual treat. Amidst the chaos of the airport, Air Garden delivers a tranquil break!

As a site specific Installation Artist, Megan Geckler tasked herself and her team with creating and installing her travel inspired piece “We’ve gotto Cross this Great Big World Somehow.” Based in Los Angeles, she travelled to and from LAX over months to design and rig this piece that is entirely constructed with multiple coloured ropes. Engineering, design, and art colluded in creating two webs suspended at LAX’s terminal 3, the colour scheme reflecting the city's west coast vibe, presenting a warm welcome to visitors and art aficionados alike.

The Journey is the brainchild of San Francisco based electronic artist Jim Campbell. The work consists of forty thousand LED bulbs strung - individually by hand - overhead to create a virtual digital ribbon at San Diego’s International Airport. Campbell taped images of friends and family swimming, and it's those visuals that punctuate the piece. Passengers in terminal 2, can look up to witness silhouettes swimming their way along the digital current.

San Francisco based painter Amy Ellingson turned to Montreal’s Mosaika to partner on her untitled ceramic piece at San Francisco’s terminal 3. At 10 feet high by 109 feet long, this was her most ambitious project, and certainly provided Mosaika with a number of challenges. The result is a stunning mural that encompasses playful splashes of colour, odd angled hand cut ceramic tiles, and loads of grout and cement. Ellingson who generally translates from the computer to the canvas, took a huge creative risk going the ceramic root, but the payoff has been huge, it’s estimated that over 7 million people will cast their eyes on her mural this year alone.

YUL Fly is visual artist Alain Paiement’s impressionistic bird eye view of his home - Montreal. The entire piece is a collection of 2,700 thousand images constructed and stitched together digitally, creating a stunning visual tapestry of the city. In order to capture unique textures and images, Alain used everything from walking the street with his camera, to the use of drones, satellite imagery, and even microscopes! His love for Montreal is a very personal visual, welcoming passengers arriving and departing Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport, whom he hopes will make their own discoveries as they enjoy the view of YUL Fly.

Atomic 3 turned to Montreal’s historical relationship with stained glass as the inspiration for NueeduVerre. The installation is a series of large coloured glass triangles suspended from the terminal ceiling. The pieces resemble a flock of birds. Atomic 3 partners, Louis-Xavier Gagnon-Lebrun, and Félix Dagenais summoned their extensive experience in theatre production to bring lighting design and drama to the work. A contemporary take on an ancient art form.

Edmonton’s Jason Carter left behind a career as a Television videographer in favour of painting large format canvas pieces. And he’s never looked back. His first airport commissioned work Mother Bear, is a playful mural situated in Edmonton’s U.S. customs hall. It evokes the look and feel of Jasper, classic Canadiana. Since then Carter has installed a second piece in Calgary, and opened a gallery in Banff. Carter considers his work as contemporary, abstract Aboriginal pop art. Whatever you want to call it, Carter is well on his way to establishing his unique brand on the Canadian Art scene.

Everything Flows, Nothing Stands Still is the intriguing title of Erin Pankratz’s playful homage to her home town of Edmonton. A ceramic artist, she chose to re-create the city and surrounding landscape in ceramic tiles. Not satisfied with two dimensions, Pankratz, built out 3D structures. She describes the work as a mosaic within a mosaic, with themes that include diversity, and the four seasons. This piece is Erin’s first commission, and has launched her into the Edmonton Art scene in a big way. Visitors passing through the airport can marvel at the massive colourful piece, which looks as though it was built out of candy. A tasty treat for the eyes.

Sculpting glass into artistic masterpieces is the passion of Winnipeg based and internationally acclaimed artist Warren Carther. His fascination with the relationship between glass and light began in the 70s. Today he works on an industrial level, to produce very unique works. Aperture, his ground breaking installation at Winnipeg James Armstrong Richardson International Airport, reflects the prairie landscape. Comprised by ten tons of glass, and taking eighteen months to create, Aperture sets a new standard in Carther’s quest to innovate his art and have it interact with travellers.