Moths to a flame, butterflies to a sunbeam, caterpillars to a leaf

Moths to a flame, butterflies to a sunbeam, caterpillars to a leaf is a public installation by hybrid artist Maria Simmons commissioned by CAFKA (Contemporary Art Forum of Kitchener + Area). The installation consists of the artist’s own vehicle, plants, grow lights, and video. Viewers are invited to enter into the vehicle’s backseat in order to watch the videos playing on the headrest monitors and think about their relationships to nostalgia, memory, and plants.

The installation is located Conestoga Mall in Waterloo.

Something will lure you here 

A woman

A horse

A baby 

Spiders, for instance, are attracted to the smell of car exhaust 

No one exactly knows why 

But something about it reminds them of warmth, security, perhaps even a sort of pheromonal attraction

It might be because exhaust is associated with ignition which is associated with the warmth and light that might attract food sources 

Like moths to a flame 

Moths actually use light in order to find their direction

They assume that the bright light must be the moon 

Although it occasionally leads to their demise, 

The light shows the moth who it is and where it is going 

Where are you going?

A highway to nowhere 

A moment of reprieve within a world so full of motion 

Perhaps you are going into the past 

Perhaps you are already there