Emma Bass is an Auckland photographic artist who has spent the past fourteen years making artworks about flowers.

Her work draws on the old Dutch tradition of flower painting, where blooms were arranged and recorded at their peak, often with a fallen petal or two as a reminder that beauty doesn’t last. Emma’s still life works explore this same idea: flowers at their fullest, and flowers as they begin to change.

Before becoming an artist, Emma worked as a nurse in Auckland and the UK, and later as a commercial photographer for more than twenty years. She is co-founder of The Floral Effect, a research and design platform exploring how flowers and floral art affect the way people feel. Her artworks hang in hospitals and hospices, and are held in private collections in New Zealand and internationally. Her work has twice been selected for the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition in London, in 2016 and 2022. 

Emma has collaborated with an Italian fashion label and with Trinity Hill wines. Her work also supports a number of New Zealand charities, including Breast Cancer Cure, the Breast Cancer Foundation, Dementia NZ and, most recently, HELP.