The Seeds of Flight, 2025
Extra dense, dyed raw cotton fabric, carbon fibre, aluminium, rope, sailcloth
15 sculptures of variable dimensions installed on the three public levels of Parkline Place
Location Parkline Place, 252 Pitt Street, Sydney
Commissioner Project developed by Investa on behalf of owners Oxford Properties Group
and Mitsubishi Estate Asia
Architects Foster + Partners
CuratorBarbara Flynn, Art Advisor
PhotographyMark Pokorny
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The product of the latest in state-of-the-art technology and exhaustive experimentation, the work is literally lighter than air and deceptively simple in its final form—comprised of cotton fabric like that used for sails, tensioned on thin nylon ropes that connect, web-like, to black aluminium rods, and held together by 3D-drawn nodes. From some vantage points, the aluminium rods create drawings in space that feel close to the workings of the artist’s mind. In line with the artist’s thoroughgoing commitment to a society free from carbon emissions, the artwork was made by him in his Berlin studio and shipped in a single box the size of an ordinary table.
The colours of the work are drawn from the palette of the eucalyptus plant, a tree native to Australia that dominates the landscape with over 700 species, providing essential habitat for wildlife, supporting biodiversity, and playing a crucial role in the country's ecology and Indigenous culture. Just as the bark of the eucalyptus reveals luminous tones, the fabric panels of the artwork reflect these hues—deep golds, fiery oranges, and rich, earthen reds. Light alters these hues, making them seem to shimmer at sunrise, vibrate at noon, or glow with warmth at sunset, echoing the way young eucalyptus leaves mature into richer, more intense shades over time. Matt Poll, Manager of Indigenous Programs at Sydney’s Australian National Maritime Museum, became Saraceno’s close collaborator, advising the artist on Aboriginal Australia and its recognition of the value and uses of the eucalyptus plant.
Visible from blocks away from Parkline Place, through the floor to ceiling glass windows of the facade, the artwork is expected to attract people at all times of day and night and act as a major meeting and gathering place in the city. It will provide another memorable Sydney experience for both those who pass through its halls every day, or to international visitors, art lovers and novices, scientists, engineers and more who are also expected to come and view The Seeds of Flight.
This important permanent public art installation, the world-renowned artist’s first in Australasia, was commissioned for Parkline Place, a new commercial building and recently minted Sydney landmark, located above Gadigal Station and one block from Sydney Town Hall, another icon. Architects Foster + Partners designed the 43 storey tower, which was developed and is managed by Investa, and is co-owned by Oxford Properties Group (‘Oxford’) and Mitsubishi Estate Asia (‘MEA’). Barbara Flynn acted as curator (2019–25).
Looking like a fleet of flying machines when viewed from the entry, and like birds in flight or leaves drifting on air from its southern side, the artwork aims to inspire a dream of co-existing differently together on Earth, and of entering new orbits of a post-fossil fuel era.
Saraceno has planted alternative ways of being on air for over two decades.1 Humanity has always imagined flying, but today, that imagination is in crisis. There are 1.3 million people in the air at any given time, releasing over 1 billion tons of CO2 annually. The Aerocene Foundation, initiated by Tomás Saraceno, aims to move us towards an ethical re-alliance with the Earth and its cosmic web(s) of life in part by collaboratively developing, testing and launching aerosolar sculptures. On January 25, 2020, in Jujuy, Argentina Aerocene Pacha rose using only the air and the sun, completely free from fossil fuels, batteries, lithium, helium, and hydrogen, setting 32 world records and becoming the most sustainable flight in human history.2
Text by Studio Tomás Saraceno and Barbara Flynn, March 2025