Tides of Tranquility

Wayne Looyen

Exhibition Dates :
Thursday 19 – Monday 30 March, 2026
10:00am – 5:00pm daily

Wayne Looyen presents an exhibition of handcrafted porcelain works featuring coral imagery finished with gold luster. The exhibition brings together skulls, animals, and organic forms that explore the intersection of beauty, fragility, and environmental loss.

Drawing on the visual language of natural history and luxury ornamentation, the works juxtapose delicate porcelain with radiant gold to reflect the vulnerability of coral reefs and marine ecosystems. Symbols traditionally associated with preservation and permanence are reimagined by Looyen to underscore the precarity of these environments in the face of climate change and human impact.

“I use porcelain and gold to echo the way we aestheticize what is disappearing,” says the artist. “These materials are historically associated with value and preservation, yet the forms reference ecosystems that are vanishing faster than we can protect them. The work is meant to hold beauty and grief in the same moment.”

At once elegant and unsettling, Tides of Tranquility invites viewers to slow down and reflect on what is being lost beneath the surface of the ocean. The exhibition creates a contemplative space where reverence and mourning coexist, encouraging a deeper consideration of how value, memory, and beauty shape our relationship with the natural world.