Get ready to ignite your imagination: globally renowned artist Matthew Aberline is headlining Subi Blooms x Gather 2026.
Subiaco’s signature and award-winning floral festival is back this May for its eighth edition – and it’s bringing with it an exciting new headline talent.
Matthew Aberline is a Sydney-based artist known for exuberant, large-format inflatables and textile-driven installations, and will be lighting up Western Australia with his work for the very first time. His installation, The Light Within, features a landscape of giant, inflatable floral lanterns which will transform Market Square Park into a glowing garden wonderland after dark. Originally showcased at Singapore’s iLight Festival and the Glow Festival in Shenzhen, China, the installation will arrive ahead of Subi Blooms x Gather on Friday 17 April and conclude on Mother’s Day, Sunday 10 May.
Aberline says the installation is designed to reconnect audiences with their inner sense of wonder. “The work is about drawing people away from their screens and devices and inviting them into this genuinely beautiful, vibrant space – filled with the most gorgeous colours and patterns.”
The series of kaleidoscopic shapes, created by Aberline with his team The Beautiful and Useful Studio, are like lanterns lighting a path into another world – where illustrated doorways lead to pockets of wonder, filled with vivid botanicals, fantastical creatures and explosive bursts of colour. Designed to be discovered both by day and by night, the installation ushers in a new era of Subi Blooms x Gather – where the magic is just as powerful after dark.
Returning with its boldest program yet, Subi Blooms x Gather will once again transform Subiaco into a vibrant destination of large-scale botanical artistry across the Mother’s Day weekend (8 – 10 May). Curated by Gather, led by acclaimed florists Rebecca Const and Lara Rose, the 2026 festival will present over 14 installations across Subiaco, this time under a new artistic theme: Flora Aurora.
Representing the essential life force of light, the theme invites artists to explore brilliance, refraction, glow and colour in both literal and metaphorical ways. Visitors can expect expressive, sculptural florals that play with shadow and light – with some select installations illuminated at night.
Aberline’s installation, together with the expanded Subi Blooms x Gather program, signals the dawn of an exciting new chapter for the festival – one that invites visitors to experience Subiaco in a whole new light.
Visit The Light Within at Market Square Park, Subiaco from Friday 17 April to Sunday 10 May, and learn more about Subi Blooms x Gather here.
