I toured the Scarecrows in the Garden exhibit at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens today. It wasn't quite as exciting as some years in the past. 2014 was my favorite year. These are some of my favorites from them. Tomorrow I'll post my favorites from today. This is always a must-see fall show and this is the 20th year that Scarecrows in the Garden has been presented at Atlanta Botanical Gardens. It is well-worth the trip to spend an afternoon here!
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Every year the garden sports more than 100 scarecrows created by artists, designers, schools, businesses and families. Contestants compete for prizes in one of two design categories: professional and nonprofessional.
I think the directors of the garden had too much beer at one of their Thursday night Fest-of-Ale beer events when they came up with the theme of Ogretober! What? I think they meant the scarecrows were to salute one of the 19 giant topiary-like sculptures that are part of the Garden's Imaginary Worlds exhibition. That sculpture is an ogre.
Confused? Yes, well, it appeared that the contestants were equally confused. The directors asked them to create their own ogre or cobra-like scarecrows to mimic the giant topiaries on display in the separate exhibit.
OK. Have another beer. . .
The garden board further instructed contestants to come up with their own imaginary world being, be it based on a childhood story or an urban legend. Huh? Ogre, Cobra, Childhood Story, Urban Legend. Next year consider maybe just a scarecrow sculpture that somehow incorporates a pumpkin. That would be both scarecrow and seasonal (Halloween). Just a thought.
Moving on. It was a far from Halloween as I've seen but still there were some stand outs for creativity like the Grand Prize Winner titled CAFFEINE-IX constructed entirely of recycled aluminum cans. From any angle this is a spectacular sculpture and incredible use of recycled materials. They turned litter into something quite beautiful.
The arrangement of different branded aluminum cans to pattern the wings was genius.
Another impressive sculpture in terms of creativity was this selfie pair of scarecrows who employed a solar powered cell phone that snapped a selfie of the duo every couple of minutes.
I don't quite understand the "no regrets" and "do you even scare crow" but. . . whatever. . .
I have no idea what this life-like chrysanthemum-themed exhibit represented. She did look real, however. . . but not much like a scarecrow and really not very Halloween-ish. Maybe she was what the judges had in mind.
Click on any image for a larger view
Also in the gardens were giant (20+ foot tall) Philip Haas FOUR SEASONS sculptures that are said to reimagine the paintings of celebrated Italian Renaissance master Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1526-93).
Inspired by Arcimboldo's series the Four Seasons are sculpted in painted fiberglass to mimic the 16th-century painter's four human portraits.
Haas offers a fresh perspective in the classical form by presenting the works in three dimensions and on a colossal scale. Hass' work is part of an art historical tradition that references the work of antecedents, creating contemporary forms routed in the history of art.
As in Arcimboldo's paintings, all of the features of the four sculpted figures are rendered in simulated plant materials corresponding to the seasons. Hass' selected medium accentuates the original works' visual puzzle of natural forms.
The Fuqua Orchid Center sports smaller-scale maquettes of the FOUR SEASONS presumably for closer inspection.
Aside from the themed-events there is plenty to see in the gardens. This water-feature wall is spectacular framing a quiet walkway that leads to the orchid house. The water flows gently from the top of the granite structure down the grooves, then disappears into the sidewalk as it is recycled.
Can you guess which season this massive sculpture represents? I could not. It is winter, but I don't understand the large orange around the neck.
Below: A honeybee in a field of daisies in front of the conservatory.
A lot of the scarecrows looked like anything but a scarecrow. Many were themed to coincide with what is apparently being taught to kids in schools in the Atlanta-area: Multiculturalism and Anti-Bullying.
Below: This cowgirl would have gotten my 2nd or 3rd place. Her dress is made completely of road maps. Her bodice is constructed of money (change). It is an impressive unconventional challenge garment. Where's Tim Gunn and Nina Garcia when you need their input?
Below, I love the massive spinning, water-spewing, living fish sculptures that reside in a prominent place in the center of the gardens.
Some fish are minnows,
Some are whales,
People like dimples,
Fish like scales,
Some fish are slim,
And some are round,
They don't get cold,
They don't get drowned.
from "The Aquarium" by Ogden Nash
Below: Edward Scissorhands. Well done, but not Halloween.
Below: My vote for runner-up. A Pumpkin Head made of nothing but aluminum orange fanta cans. Very nice.
My favorite fountain
with hidden faces in the lotus
GAME OF THRONES
in the garden
There were three Game of Thrones themed sculptures in the garden. The one above is probably the most creative. I would have awarded it 3rd place overall.
Above and Below:
This Game of Thrones was the most realistic.
The amazing feathers made of corrugated cardboard boxes
would have earned this sculpture 2nd place were I handing out the ribbons.
I like the nod to Halloween with the sword piercing the pumpkin.
This King and Queen Game of Thrones pair received the best placement of the three sculptures but I thought it more child-like and missing the Halloween aspect necessary to garner my vote.
I saw no reference to zombies or other mythical creatures. What about a vampire? A ghost? Wouldn't all three entities reside in "imaginary worlds?"
Below: A whimsical frog topiary in a pond by the conservatory.
Below: My favorite topiaries ever.
A pair of Gorillas that at times blend into the landscape and
at other times jump out like wild animals.
Wonderful. I'll take two.
Below: Another honorable mention. Hearts were the theme and they were all made of aluminum cans. I now know what to do with all those aluminum cans I collect (litter) on my long walks.
A lady-bug themed scarecrow
A merman. Heidi Klum might have said it was a little cliche?
San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury Hippie Skeleton something-or-other display.
Another favorite: Giant Shaggy Dog.
Blogger.
that experience in the Appalachian woods of North Carolina, tomorrow.
What We've Read:
Mosquito Magnets
Are you a mosquito magnet? It’s because of how you smell.
Your body is a big protein shake that smells like stinky feet for hungry mosquitoes, a new study has found
Some people are magnets for mosquitoes, emitting a tantalizing combination of chemicals that invites the pesky insects to dine on them.
Researchers at Rockefeller University in New York found people who have higher levels of certain acids on their skin are 100 times more attractive to the female Aedes aegypti, the type of mosquito responsible for spreading diseases such as dengue, chikungunya, yellow fever and Zika.
The findings, published Tuesday in the journal Cell, could lead to new products that could mask or alter certain human odors, making it harder for mosquitoes to find human blood and potentially curbing the spread of disease.
Mosquito-borne diseases impact about 700 million people per year, and experts expect that number to increase as global temperatures rise, said Jeff Riffell, a professor at the University of Washington and a mosquito expert who wasn’t involved in the research. The A. aegypti mosquitoes are known to live in tropical or subtropical climates, but the insect now breeds year-round in the District and parts of California.
More species of mosquitoes are invading Florida, including the dreaded Aedes scapularis. They are also attracted to human proteins.
Just by breathing, we’re broadcasting to mosquitoes that we’re there, said Leslie Vosshall, the chief scientific officer at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the lead researcher behind the new study. Female mosquitoes are built to bite for blood because without it they won’t have enough protein to reproduce.
“Think of it like a big protein shake,” Vosshall said. “It’s a way for them, over the course of one minute, to take in the equivalent of 150 pounds of food and then use that to produce eggs.”
Scientists already knew these mosquitoes have a preference for some humans over others but the reason isn’t fully understood.
Experts have found people seem to become more attractive to mosquitoes when they’re pregnant or after they’ve had a few beers, prompting further research into whether mosquitoes may be drawn to certain odors.
Vosshall, whose lab is at Rockefeller University, set out to find why some people seem to smell better to an A. aegypti mosquito than others.
Fortunately, nobody had to sit in a room full of mosquitoes to conduct this experiment. Instead, the researchers collected the natural scent from people’s skin by having them wear nylon stockings on their arms. They cut the stockings into two-inch pieces and placed two pieces of the fabric behind two separate trap doors in a clear plastic box where dozens of mosquitoes were flying around. The researchers then opened the traps and the insects would choose to fly to the bait — the stockings — behind the first or the second door.
Vosshall said the researchers conducted a round-robin style tournament and counted each time an insect was drawn to a particular sample, much like points in a basketball game. One of the samples, described as being from “subject 33,” emerged as a favorite of the insects.
“Subject 33 won a hundred games,” Vosshall said. “They were totally undefeated. Nobody beat them.”
The study found that people like subject 33, who have higher levels of compounds called carboxylic acids on their skin, are more likely to be “mosquito magnets,” Vosshall said.
All humans produce carboxylic acid through sebum, a waxy coating, on their skin. The sebum is then eaten by the millions of beneficial microorganisms that colonize our skin to produce more carboxylic acid. In copious amounts, the acid can produce an odor that smells like cheese or smelly feet, Vosshall said. That smell appears to attract the female mosquitoes on the hunt for human blood.
Notably, the nylon stockings used in the study didn’t actually smell like sweat, she said. The mosquitoes are incredibly sensitive to human odor; and perfume or cologne can’t cover it up. The experiment was conducted over the course of three years, and the same people continued to appeal to mosquitoes, regardless of what they ate that day or whether they changed their shampoo, Vosshall said
“If you’re a mosquito magnet today,” Vosshall said, “you will be a mosquito magnet three years from now.”
The study didn’t answer why some people have more carboxylic acids on their skin than others. But, Vosshall said the composition of the skin microbiome is unique in every individual.
“Everybody has a completely unique village of bacteria living on their skin,” Vosshall said. “Some of the mosquito magnetism differences we’re seeing here may simply be the differences in types of bacteria.”
LJ Zwiebel, a professor at Vanderbilt University who was not involved in the research, said that while carboxylic acids are clearly implicated in the study, there’s no “single compound” that attracts mosquitoes. It’s probably a “cocktail” of different components that signals the mosquito to home in and bite, he said.“The mosquito is a multimodal magnet that uses a lot of different signals,” Zwiebel said. The carboxylic acids are “one significant component but not the only one.”
For someone who doesn’t want to be bitten by mosquitoes, Zwiebel said his advice is to take a shower to cut down on “all these juicy compounds” that are on your skin, especially around your feet, with its “unique odors.”
Vosshall said the future lies in figuring out how to “manipulate” the odors that originate from the skin and, potentially, the bacteria living there. Scientists, for instance, may be able to develop a probiotic skin cream that interferes with or reduces the levels of certain byproducts, which could make a person less attractive to mosquitoes.
“Only when you understand what makes people a mosquito magnet can you begin to brainstorm ways to stop that,” Vosshall said.
Mosquito Magnet originally published by
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