Tag: nature

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Agentic AI Gardening

The use of AI is probably most popular for professional purposes as efficiency and economic productivity are major concerns in these fields of applications. Another whole lot of applications is rapidly developing as well, which is Agentic AI in hobbies like gardening. The use of IT in gardening has previously been reserved to landscape designers and maybe urban to rural planners. Cheap access to AI on a test basis or within your browser has widened access to computer and AI assistance for gardening purposes. Colorful designs and selection of species to enrich biodiversity are widely available now. The next step is, of course, agentic use of AI. If we have a sufficient number of sensors installed (and use weather forecast data as well), the data from the garden can easily be analyzed by AI and the mower or water pump can get going to do the job for us. This is not rocket science but only sensors, data and a couple of “if …, then” commands. The kind of pleasure will have changed accordingly shifting from the watering of plants to the satisfaction of successful programming. No value judgement here. The latter option has, however, a considerable business potential of almost industrial or agro-economic scale. 

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Flower Power

In the 1960s the flower power movement originated in the USA. The association of flowers in all their shapes and shades within fashion has played a role already over centuries. The most prominent use of flower imagery can be traced back to the 18th century when the many specialized professions contributed to the embellishment of humans through the reference to motifs around flowers. This is made explicit in the exhibition and catalog of “Tisser, broder, sublimer” in the Palais Galliera, Musée de la mode in Paris 2026-3. Nature and especially flowers have so many different shapes to offer that it can serve as an endless inspiration to creation and the arts. Power has been derived from special dress and community building as well. Flower power is interesting in this regard because it has been and keeps being used what is now known as the fashion industry as well. The soft power of beauty and sensual persuasion is lasting flower power.  

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Polychrome tree

Maybe it is just a matter of taste whether you prefer a tree polychrome i. e. in full colors in spring or more monochrome during winter in almost black against a white background. Others might argue that it is not a singular version or time of the tree’s growth cycle, but the steady change. In any case the same tree never looks the same before and after rain. The only certainty is “the times are a changing”, so do our preferences. They are changing as well from time to time. Few persons have similar preferences over the life course and business, marketing and societal changes drive such changes. Often we hardly notice them. Trees are a perfect point of reference to check your personal preferences. Our smartphones track our preferences just by analyzing frequencies of photos taken over months or years. They have a very differentiated polychrome view of us. The reasons to take ugly pictures might confuse the AI-assisted exploitation of our polychrome or monochrome preferences. 

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Tree as sculpture

Nature has lots of treasures to offer. A tree is just a splendid sculpture if we take the time to look at them. Over years, decades, sometimes even centuries, a sophisticated sculpture arises due to the imprints of sun, wind and rain over time. There are so many trees around us if we take care of them a little bit better . The simple appreciation of nature’s beauty can be the start of a longer journey. Many people remember a specific tree (Lindenbaum) that had some importance during their childhood or adolescence. Some even choose a tree to be buried nearby. Our life course reflects the growing of a tree. In some cultures you are considered an accomplished human being only if you have planted a tree. Examples of a miniature version of a tree are bonsai trees from the Japanese tradition. The real treasures of life might be just in your neighborhood.

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Projection Painting

Nature teaches us lots of tricks. Bionics are all around us in the 21st century, but the marvelous projection of a winter tree on a huge screen comes close to a naturalistic painting. The projection of the branches and leaves of a tree originates from the early sunset in December 2025 in Berlin. Nature teaches beauty and the techniques to imitate or reproduce the effects. Its up to us to keep our eyes, senses and minds open to enjoy the beauty in our surroundings. 

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Foul-smelling dictatorship

The animal world is full of interesting strategies of how to turn over a foul-smelling ruler or dictatorship. The ant queen of “lasius orientalis” infiltrates a colony of “lavius flavus” to spray the incumbent queen with a foul-smelling substance which turns the worker ants against their own queen and eventually kills the queen. This is a rather intelligent strategy to trick the defense system of rival colonies and prepare a takeover of a whole colony to install your own reign.
This may constitute a stark warning for democracies just as much as a threat to persistent dictatorships. In the age of the not so social media there is a lot of foul-smells produced. Beware of the risks to democracy as open societies are much easier to infiltrate than closed societies or dictatorships. (Link)

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Spring in Autumn

Can we have spring in autumn? Of course not, most people would answer. The definitions of spring and autumn are clearly defined as separate seasons. Depictions of the seasons in paintings in the Romantic or Impressionist periods are hard to imagine with somewhat blurred distinctions between seasons. And yet, climate change in the 21st century show surprising spring flowers in autumn across Europe. This leads to lots of confusion in nature’s time table.
From a life course perspective, we may ask, whether it is possible to experience a 2nd spring in the season’s view of the life course. More healthy years and spring feelings in the autumn of live have propelled a whole new industry around longevity and the mantra to “stay healthy for the wealthy”. The growing health inequality over the extended life course is a silent killer. The experience of spring in autumn remains a distant dream for most people with multi-morbidity.
Our experience of sequential or linear time, where one season follows the other, gets disturbed or at least blurred. The “Gleichzeitigkeit des Ungleichzeitigen” in English the “simultaneity of the non-simultaneous“ can be observed in the macro-world of everyday experience, albeit in a different way than Ernst Bloch defined the concept. On the other hand, it is no longer necessary to invoke Einstein’s theory of relativity or quantum physics to come up with apparently strange phenomena, but empirical facts allow us to question received wisdom, evidence based.

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Sink / Rise

Nick Brandt presented his engaged photographic projects “The day may break” in Brussels at the Hangar Gallery space in Brussels (2025-9-21). The photographic work spans the globe to document and tell the story of a an endangered planet. The environmental and social fabric is at risk of an unprecented scale in the 21st century. Rather than producing hours of documentation, Nick Brandt focuses on images that stick. His “mise en scene” is meant to haunt us. And it succeeds in it. In the best sense of a tradition of a “photographe engagé” he intends to convey messages, even whole narratives to us about and from people in remote places, who are endangered through our inaction or paralysis in front of the challenges posed by global warming and climate change as well as the social and societal consequences.
We can save people from drowning in floods and rising sea levels. The chapter Sink / Rise of this project was produced with people from the Fiji islands who participated in the futuristic scenario of a sunk island. Without accusations, these people question us. Why? How? What for? Where to? – without speaking a word. They spend time in on a sunk island, surrounded, submerged by beautiful, but morbid, turquoise water and the graveyard-like remainders of a broken coral reef. These are photographs not of these people, but about them, about their likely fate, and (very important) produced with them as empowered actors. May they have a chance to rise like a phoenix from the ashes from these photos.
The documentation on the “Making of …” (image below) as part of the same exhibition allows transparency and additional insights into the artist’s work and proceedings.
(Image: Hangar Gallery, Brussels 2025-9-21, On the making of Sink / Rise by Nick Brandt)

 

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Vacation Waves

One of the most popular choices for a vacation is in connection with waves. There seems to be something mystical or romantic related to waves, which touches many people irrespective of their background and across continents. This goes much beyond what we know about waves from physics or maths and this is already a fascinating scientific story in itself. Sailing adepts will be able to tell marvellous tales about waves, too. Coming back from a vacation near the sea or a lake, you surely may add another story to the already rich inventory of waves in art or literature. The imagery about waves started early as well, ever since sailors started to conquer the world.

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Timeless Nature

The beauty of butterflies has fascinated thousands of generations. It is the boomers’ generation that has increased the risks that future generations will have difficulties to enjoy the simple beauty of nature in their gardens or parks. Preservation of biodiversity is a value that should be ranked much higher than previously. Monitoring of biodiversity needs a generation of people well aware what a rich ecosystem and biodiversity looks like and how to preserve or restore it. Much to do for teaching and learning professionals as well. Curriculum development for biodiversity and sustainability is in urgent need for updates. This has to include the socioeconomic dimension as well.