A Dark Day in Paradise

An installation by Clare Twomey for museumaker

Thousands of black ceramic butterflies have been installed in the Royal Pavilion by artist Clare Twomey. The butterflies swarm in the Banqueting Room, the Great Kitchen and the Entrance Hall, and flutter darkly throughout the ground floor of the palace. The work is a response to the excesses of the building, with the butterflies symbolising the transience of life and the vanity of earthly things. They are both beautiful and menacing, an invitation for visitors to reflect on the history of the building and to draw contemporary parallels.

Clare Twomey is a British ceramicist/artist who works with clay in large-scale installations, sculpture and site-specific works. She has exhibited at Tate, Victoria & Albert Museum, Crafts Council and the Museum of Modern Art in Kyoto, Japan.