The history of the birth of this picture is very unique. I passed by a second-hand bookshop when I caught the sight of an unusaul copy of an old map. I went into the shop to discover this map. It was an old map printed in the end of the 16th century showing the low countries of Western Europe as a tongue shooting paw raising Lion named Leo Belgicus.  The map was that unique that I bought it at once. I knew at once I would made a picture using it, but how? I was preparing for the exhibition for the Flower Carnival in August so the picture was to feature flowers as I had decided earlier to take only such pictures to this exhibitions which featured flowers. I learned that the capital of the Imperial State of the low countries named Seventeen Provinces in the end of the 16th century was Brussels.

 

I remembered also that when we travelled to Brussels a year before I saw some pictures of the Grande Place covered by a flower carpet. I learned that this type of festival happens once in every two years in August when the Grande Place is realy covered instead of cobble by a begonia carpet as Belgium is the largest begonia growe in the world. This gave me the idea to make my own flower carpet by using this piece of unique map. Starting from the birth of the idea my task was to find the stamps to be used only. I wish to draw your attention also to the fact that the white carpet pieces are also made of stamps only upside, or more exactly feature down.