Called “Floating Flowers” by Thomas Haneman, his fantastical botanical paintings, richly toned and wildly inventive, could be specimens from outer space, underwater, or some sort of Eden. Positioned out-of-space and time; they joyously spring from his canvases, unfettered by nature or science. Many of them face away from the viewer, growing in the direction of an unseen source of light or energy.

After emerging from a long and crippling depression, and inspired by his garden, Haneman’s subjects appear like synapses, the fresh sparks in his brain, brought on by his new-found happiness and excitement for life. They are the visual result of his healing; synaptic displays of joy.

His paintings bear reference to seventeenth-century Dutch still-life and eighteenth-century botanical illustrations, while feeling atemporal and contemporary.