CHIAOZZA — playful sculptures amid the flowers at New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill

If you exclaim "What is that?" when coming across one of the 10 large sculptures featured as part of "CHIAOZZA: A Sculpture Exhibition" at New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill in Boylston, there's no need to worry about the creators taking offense.

In fact, Brooklyn, N.Y.-based artists Adam Frezza and Terri Chiao, known collaboratively as CHIAOZZA, will be more than happy to hear it.

"I think one of our favorite responses is 'What is that?' (It's) the curiosity," Frezza said.

"I think what that signifies — it holds the viewer in a moment where you have a feeling about something but cannot name it. I think that moment is really a nice place to be. It's important to continue to flex our brains," Chiao concurred.

Curious Forms

"CHIAOZZA: A Sculpture Exhibition," which opened June 1 and runs until Oct. 15, has 10 large sculptures called “Gemels” ranging in height from five to ten feet each outside at NEBG. The playful looking works are painted paper pulp forms set on white pedestals. They emerge along walking paths, or are nestled among plantings, in flower beds, under trees, and even in a fountain.

The works reflect the curious forms found in grafted trees and shrubs. "Gemel" (the Latin word for "a pair") is often used in forestry to describe two trees that have grown together. Frezza and Chiao use the term “Gemels” for their sculptures at NEBG because of the poetic metaphor and the creative permission it gives and encourages to explore their artistic ideas of interesting forms and shapes, they said. The exhibition is also inspired by Leo Lionni’s concept of a “parallel botany.”  In 1977, Lionni wrote the book "Parallel Botany" in which he explored the world of imagined plants.

A viewer's curiosity can lead to further investigation as additional sculptures, wall works, and a short film created by the artists are on view inside NEBG at the Milton Gallery.

"I think there's enough layers (to the exhibition ) that an an investigation can continue," Frezza said.

“We approached this exhibition with the idea of an art walk in mind,” Frezza and Chiao said in an artists' statement about "CHIAOZZA: A Sculpture Exhibition"

“We want to encourage people to wander through the landscape and happen upon something that might evoke a sense of wonder, play, contemplation, connection, or peacefulness.”

You can take a walk with Frezza and Chiao at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. June 24. Ticket information is available online at nebg.org.

You can take a walk with Frezza and Chiao on June 24. Tours are at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Tickets can be reserved on the for the 11 a.m and here for the 2 p.m, tour.

'Just seemed Natural'

CHIAOZZA (rhymes with “wowza” or “yowza”) is the collaborative practice of Frezza and Chiao and named from an amalgam of their last names — Chiao-zza. Since they were working together and their creations would not exist without the other person, the name "just seemed to be natural," Frezza said.

Their studio, founded in 2011, explores play and craft across a range of mediums, including sculpture, painting, works on paper, installation, design, and public art. They are also a couple and have a daughter, Tove.

CHIAOZZA has been featured in solo shows and installed public artworks in New York City’s Central Park and Tappen Park, the Northeastern University campus in Boston, and other locations across the country and abroad. In 2017, Frezza and Chiao created an acre-spanning 32-sculpture installation at Coachella Art & Music Festival.

“We are thrilled to welcome these accomplished artists to the Garden and to share their wonderfully creative and inspiring work with our community,” said New England Botanic Garden CEO Grace Elton. “This exhibition promises to be a summer highlight for people of all ages across the region.”

Chiao said she and Frezza have been talking with officials at NEBG for two to three years about putting on an exhibition.

"We made a proposal based on a site visit," Frezza said. Visits always seemed to be in October and November. When the couple came to Boylston to install the exhibition at the end of May they got a new view of NEBG.

"It was a beautiful surprise to show up with a truck full of sculptures and everything was in full bloom ... Our daughter was with us and got to run around the grounds," Chiao said.

"The weather was perfect," said Frezza. "To see these things finally reach their resting place was special."

NEBG is "a really charming place," Chiao said.

The sculptures, which the couple had been working on at their Brooklyn studio, were transported to NEBG with the help of a "local transport team to safely move the pieces," Frezza said. "There's a lot of invisible work that's done to make it feel these pieces have always been there."

The paper pulp forms are in segments that are threaded to the white pedestals.

"We wanted to make it feel that the art gallery was exported to the garden," Chiao said.

The white pedestals give the works an art museum look that "helps create this sense of reverence," Frezza said. On a practical level the sculptures "should be able to hold up to the sun and rain," he said.

The paper pulp is made from recycled tree-based papers, then mixed with wood glue to make it more durable for being displayed outdoors. Frezza and Chiao work with a color palette of "vibrant, pigment-rich colors balanced with more subdued natural tones to create playful work that brings liveliness to our daily experience."

'The poetry in that science'

The couple got part of the the idea for creating their own "Gemels" when they were staying at an apple orchard in Vermont for a few months during the pandemic starting in March, 2020, Chiao said.

"It didn't just come from that experience but being around these forms was quite striking. A lot of these trees are grafted. What was striking was that you have two species of tree that have grown together, and then to see the transformations of the trees - such a beautiful transformation that we got to witness," Chiao said.

"We liked the poetry in that science," Frezza said.

The Gemel series began in 2020 and continues to evolve with the artists’ exploration of the parallels between sculptural invention and botanical growth and experimentation. The NEBG exhibition celebrates these surprising creative parallels between horticultural experimentation and art and invites people of all walks of life to find joy in the process of discovery in nature.

"To show sculpted things in a garden (at NEBG) is really exciting," said Chiao.

Frezza and Terri Chiao exhibited their first works as a collaborative duo in 2012 at Wave Hill Public Garden & Cultural Center in the Bronx, N.Y. The show, titled, "A Controlled Wild," explored the parallels between sculptural invention and botanical growth and experimentation by presenting a luminous “greenhouse” within a sunroom filled with living and fictional plants.

The response was "rich, encouraging and supportive," Frezza said, and was motivation for the the couple to keep exploring horticultural themes artistically.

There will be a time in October, however, when the NEBG exhibition will have to be taken off the grounds.

"So far the plan is to take this back (to Brooklyn), touch them up, and show them in a gallery somewhere," Frezza said.

Or perhaps "outside in a different location ... It will be an opportunity to see how our construction is holding up," he said.

Still, the art, like a plant, could now be called a living thing.

"We'll try to give them their best longest life as we know how," Frezza said.

Summer Evenings Series

Meanwhile, New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill has begun its popular Thursday Summer Evenings series. This weekly after-hours event includes live music by local musicians, a beer garden, lawn games, "light bites," and more. The series began June 15 and runs Thursdays to July 27, 5-9 p.m.; and Aug. 3 - 31, 5-8 p.m. Visitors can hike the mile-long loop trail, wander the gardens to enjoy the summer blooms, and catch the sunset over the Wachusett Reservoir. On select Thursdays, the Amateur Telescope Makers of Boston will set up telescopes in the gardens, allowing guests to interact with them and view the night sky in a whole new way. Also, there will be workshops and classes from botanical mixology to firefly walks and sunset yoga. Learn more and reserve tickets online.  For more information about New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill, visit www.nebg.org.

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: CHIAOZZA — sculptures amid the flowers at New England Botanic Garden