Zilker Garden lights up with neon, costumes for Surreal Garden

April 12, 2023

When you wish to see a well-recognized backyard with a contact of surreality, humor and neon artwork, the surreal garden occasion in Zilker Botanical Garden and to you. It’s for me! I attended the inaugural occasion final 12 months and fortunately returned this 12 months.

The Surreal Backyard is an Austin neon artwork exhibit ionic art and features a dwell DJ and dancing, efficiency artists, meals vehicles, money bars and Austinites wearing artistic costumes. Every part occurs within the rose backyard, the prehistoric backyard and the doorway backyard of the Zilker Backyard.

I really like costume occasion, and the Surreal Backyard delivers. This couple sporting disconcertingly lifelike barn owl outfits was my favourite. They toyed with the impact by remaining silent and discreetly tilting their heads when requested to pose for a photograph. My husband nicknamed them “hooded owls”.

As you stroll by the backyard, neon animals glow on the foliage like one thing out of a dream.

Here is one other improbable costume: a mushroom girl!

It coordinates with a neon mushroom with eyes, which watches you move.

Oh look, one other particular person with three eyes!

neon agave

A neon man-eating monster – an enormous angler fish – has returned from final 12 months’s occasion.

Similar to this long-legged elephant.

Many Austinites “tuned in” to the Surreal Backyard final Saturday after Thursday and Friday had rain. The occasion takes place once more this week on the thirteenth, 14th and fifteenth of April. A extra refined VIP evening can be accessible on the sixteenth.

It is a great way to start out your hula and assist Zilker Botanical Garden Conservationwhich receives 25% of income, which Zilker Backyard makes use of to keep up and enhance the gardens.

Think about changing into a member of the ZBG Conservancy too! You get free admission to the backyard for one 12 months, plus reciprocal admission to many different botanical gardens, together with the Girl Fowl Johnson Wildflower Middle in Austin, the Dallas Arboretum, and the John Fairey Backyard in Hempstead.

Lights projected onto Zilker’s gazebo mirror onto the koi pond.

A neon hippo emerges from one other pond.

And a leaping hammerhead shark provides slightly risk.

This perky couple, each sporting pink and bunny ears, stood out from the group.

An Alice in Wonderland reference matches the surreal theme. Comply with the neon white rabbit down the reflective rabbit gap.

neon chameleon

The Picasso-style face portray turned her right into a murals.

Extra faces, of the Easter Island selection

Even the crops tackle a surreal high quality beneath the neon lighting, like this sago palm.

neon sea dragon

And one other monkfish

Uh-oh, the aliens have landed.

Within the prehistoric backyard, a limestone cliff wall glows with neon petroglyphs. A sub-sardine additionally accompanies.

Neon hats of every kind are widespread in Surreal Backyard. Fairy and butterfly wings too. This lovely couple reveals off each.

Neon jellyfish hanging from the bushes close to the dinosaur sculpture – who wears neon cowboy boots! — within the prehistoric backyard.

Extra heads from Easter Island, in dialog

And neon tigers, itching for a battle

A girl on a flying fish soars over the waterfall within the prehistoric backyard. She’s dwelling her finest neon life, and so are you able to. Tickets to the Surreal GardenWeekend leases can be found for $50 prematurely and on the door. Surreal fantasies are inspired.

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going deeper

Add to your succulent assortment at Austin Cactus & Succulent Society Spring Sale and Show on April fifteenth and sixteenth, from 10 am to five pm, on the Zilker Botanical Backyard. Come benefit from the plant present, purchase distinctive crops and ceramics, and take part in a silent public sale and sweepstakes. Free with paid admission to the Zilker Botanical Backyard.

Stroll by 9 designer landscapes within the Austin Outdoor Tour 2023 on Might sixth. Designers and builders shall be readily available to reply your questions. The fee is $33.85 for adults and $17.85 for kids ages 12-17. For security, nobody beneath 12 years of age, besides carried infants.

Come study backyard design from the consultants at Backyard Spark! I personally host talking engagements with inspiring designers, panorama architects, and authors a couple of occasions a 12 months in Austin. These are restricted attendance occasions that promote out shortly, so be certain to join the Backyard Spark e mail checklist to be notified prematurely. Simply click on on this hyperlink and ask to be added. Season 7 begins in August. Keep tuned for the schedule!

All materials © 2023 by Pam Penick for Digging. Unauthorized copy prohibited.