Berndaut Smilde Conjures Clouds Indoors

Berndnaut Smilde has challenged preconceptions of visual art with 'Nimbus II'. In this collection of photographs, a natural entity has become synthetic, and what has always been ephemeral is now captured forever.

A thematic continuation of Smilde's original 'Nimbus' (pictured below), 'Nimbus II' features a petite, fairy floss-like cloud hovering below the lofty white ceiling of Hotel MariaKapel in Hoorn, Netherlands.

Smilde generates the clouds using a smoke machine, carefully monitoring the humidity of the room and using lighting to enhance the life-like essence of the storm cloud.

"On the one hand I wanted to create an ominous situation. You could see the cloud as a sign of misfortune," said Smilde of 'Nimbus' in a 2010 interview with Probe online gallery. "You could also read it as an element out of the Dutch landscape paintings in a physical form in a classical museum hall. At the same time I wanted to make (for once) a very clear image, an almost cliché and cartoon-like visualisation of having bad luck."

Despite the bad luck connotations of a cloud, the photos of 'Nimbus II' succeed in establishing a whimsical element as well. Smilde said that this work plays with the concept of the ephemeral and is influenced by "physical presence found within transitional space."

[via Trendhunter]