"Drought Flowers" in local newspaper

Art Project Blooms At SCC: Student Puts Flowers Made From Cds On Display
By Nika Megino
DAILY REPUBLIC - July 28, 2008

FAIRFIELD, CA — Standing at least a foot tall and gleaming in the sun, Maya WindDancer's flowers might catch the eyes of anyone who visits Solano Community College.

What makes WindDancer's flowers unique? The SCC art student's flowers are made from used CDs and bamboo sticks.
 

Her "Drought Flowers" were part of a project for an art class that required students to create an art piece from 100 identical items. The blue, purple and silver CD flowers are on display between the college's theater and art building and will remain there through September.

The project was inspired by science fiction novelist Larry Niven's "Ringworld," in which he writes about metallic sunflowers that use solar energy to kill enemies, but WindDancer's 44 flowers made from 500 CDs seek to present a different message.

"The idea is that this is all we'll be able to have if the drought doesn't end," WindDancer said.

Although the drought flowers were made for a final class assignment, it was a two-year project for WindDancer, who always wanted to make an art piece out of CDs. 

The idea of using CDs came to WindDancer, 55, because people tend to toss them away as garbage too casually.

Despite the industrial look of the flowers, WindDancer took time to make the pieces react like a normal flower would. It had to be able to swing in the wind but stay rooted in the ground, she said.

"It was very challenging trying to figure out how it'll work," WindDancer said.

She began the project in 2006 by gluing together two CDs and placing them on a bamboo stick in her backyard to learn how the CDs would handle sunlight and the weather.

Once she realized the flower would survive, she began making more and figured out how to arrange them. She started collecting CDs, with most coming from donations.

Each flower consists of a bamboo stick as the stem and a minimum of 10 CDs as the flower's petals. The CDs are bolted to the bamboo stick, which is planted into soil.

The display debuted in mid-May after WindDancer spent one week installing the flowers. Since then, she has been surprised by the feedback she has received. 

"People really get it. It's so funny that people will keep it clean," said WindDancer, who added the area in which the flowers stand used to be full of trash.

"It's just been a really interesting adventure full of surprises," she added.