At Artist Rone’s exhibition, “TIME”, above the Clock Towers in Flinders Street (Melbourne), I was swallowed whole by the immersive experience of walking inside his artwork, which consisted of reminders of the fragility and impermanence of beauty. One of the many parts that made up the whole, was an arrangement of dead flowers. They were stunning in their brokenness, in their aftermath. It was as if they were once for someone to appreciate, smell, hold, stroke… gifted to someone who wished to do the same to their beloved. Yet, there they were. The exquisite leftovers of What Once Was. And sometimes flowers aren’t enough. Blooming neither. It’s in the death of a preconceived notion of beauty where our true freedom can lie. Where we leave the old skin behind as we move forward, shapeshifting into new forms.