Artist and photographer Emily Bates began the series Lost Spring during the sun-filled spring of 2020, also known as the first Covid-19 lockdown in the Netherlands.

Held in the mouth, the plants and flowers collected during local walks, resemble face-masks.

Masks to protect, to celebrate and to mourn.

The series was a daily meditation practice and personal reflection on the surreal and uncertain times experienced during the global pandemic, yet resonates and references beyond this situation.

Made simply with an iPhone, the images were shared on social media with friends around the world, during a time of physical isolation, fear and loss.

A selection of the floral self-portraits has also been printed as postage stamps. Playfully they reconnect us, crossing borders freely once more. The kiss of saliva used to attach stamp to envelope or postcard, returns an intimacy and touch so long held hidden behind the mask and pandemic imposed isolation. The mouth tenderly invoked by the gesture, remains invisible, yet may still pose a risk.

The two shared here were made originally in remembrance of a Swedish artist and dear friend, who passed early in the pandemic. Not only in colour but in name, Forget-me-not and Rape seed, they connect also with the terrors of life unfolding in Ukraine. They have therefore been offered as a fundraising edition to assist with kukhnia, a kitchen project feeding refugees in Lviv.

The virus and the flora know not of borders, passports or world orders, they blow in the winds, taking root and evolve together where the terrain allows. It is a small and modest gesture perhaps, but returns us to the chants and phrases used by the suffragettes and peace marchers, such as ‘we need our bread and our roses too’, and ‘make love not war’.