Do!aqua Mini-M: riverrun

[Khanh]

Your rock work is great! Very nice mini aquariums.

[Ugly Genius]

Thanks, Khanh. The hardscape is still evolving, but I think I'm close to how I'm going to leave it once the UG's filled in. I'd estimate the carpet to be forty-five percent filled in. Probably another month before I can fill it.

Speaking of which...
I'm thinking of having this tank really low maintenance. (I do realize that I always say that a given tank will be low maintenance and then end up going the opposite direction. And I do realize that I also say that I realize that I always say that. But this time, despite realizing that I always say that and saying that I realize that I always say that, I...nevermind.) It'll have twenty-six watts, but hung high so as to lessen the intensity. I've grown UG without CO2 and I figure that since I'm dry-starting it and there'll be no rush to have it grow out quickly, I'll forgo carbon dioxide. I'll use a HOB filter because I want to plant a moss or some such inside it's container as it seems cool to have a tank filtered by plants. I plan to stock the tank heavily with shrimp because rockscapes are too boring without something moving inside of them.

That's the plan, at least. Fill Day is still a month away, so who knows--?

[mgdmirage]

what kind of rock is this?

[oldpunk78]

are we (as a whole with iwagami[sp?]) trying to recreate mountains or something entirely different? idk - i just got back from a mountain vacation and didn't see a whole lot like we are trying to recreate. i do love this current evolution - i guess i'm just curious as to what we are trying to achieve.

this was the closest thing i could capture on film (so to speak)



i'm definitely not trying to criticize here, just looking for answers.

[Francis Xavier]

Iwagumi is an interesting beast to tackle. Contrary to popular belief, it has a very, very wide range of things that it can represent. Iwagumi dates way way back as a cultural type of garden design used by the Japanese, and these principles all carry over to Iwagumi as implemented in aquaria. It also has ties, by nature of the type of art that it is, with Suiseki (the art of stone appreciation, and finding and displaying stones that look like objects such as mountains, animals, people, etc).

Imagine a zen rock garden (karesansui), where most commonly it has just big black stones and sand (although low-lying mosses and shrubs have been used before too). The sand represents water (this is why it is raked). The stones are harder to describe, in a lot of cases they represent islands, but most importantly they are designed to give the viewer a certain feel or impression (I know the terminology is loose at best here). As I understand it, the sand doesn't necessarily have to represent literal water such as the ocean to island example, but more importantly, represents the essence of water as one of, if not the most important elements of life and creation. So the relationship in those layouts doesn't necessarily need to be so literal as island and water. The best way I can think of to explain it right now, is that this relationship represents mountains, islands, ponds, streams, hills, in an abstract way, not a literal way. Hence the importance on the "impression" of the individual viewer, so they may reach some kind of moment of zen, I would suppose.

Now, take another example of Iwagumi - Iwagumi as used in Tsukiyama gardens. This type is perhaps less well known in the western world, but had a lot of popularity in Japan in the past 100 years or so. I remember when I was writing my japanese thesis on the subject of japanese gardens, my professor commented on learning how to make these in school when she was young. This type of Iwagumi is attempting to recreate a literal reconstruction of a famous landscape of Japan or China, as an example. The major goal in these designs is A) to recreate a real landscape B) to make the garden look much bigger than it is. Most of these gardens tend to be rather small, but look much bigger. One of the ways they do this is by planting shrubs and bushes in such a way that they block the periphery buildings, etc from view. By doing this, usually they try to capture say, a mountain in the background that gets framed by the plants to make it look like the mountain is a part of the garden, instead of far off in the distance.

These are only a couple of examples - I would suggest looking at pictures of various japanese gardens, or better yet, visiting them if you have the opportunity. These gardens probably provide better insight than looking at aquarium Iwagumi's.

The short answer to your question is that very basically an Iwagumi can replicate a mountain chain, a rocky shore, a cliff-face, rolling hills, or just about anything that involves stone. Or it can be more subtle and just allude to being rolling hills or mountains in abstract ways. Basically, the only real thing that ties all Iwagumi designs together is some very simple rules, that essentially amount to proper placement in accordance to golden rules, the existence of a main stone and supporting structure/stones (even in mountain scapes there is a main stone at the focal point somewhere, even if cleverly hidden and blended with the others), the lack of driftwood (only rocks!), and a careful selection of limited amounts of plants to accentuate the rocks (this doesn't necessarily mean that you can only have one carpet and one background plant, it just means that the rocks must frame the rocks, or magnify their presence, etc etc etc, they aren't just jungle masses more common of driftwood or non hardscaped layouts).

Hope this helps,

-X

P.S. good work so far UG!

[oldpunk78]

thanks for the insight francis. very helpful.

UG - what are you trying to recreate? (if you don't mind...)

[Ugly Genius]

nk. riverrun -- the name stolen from the first word of James Joyce's terribly difficult book, Finnegans Wake, in which the first word of the book, "riverrun", flows mid-sentence and uncapitalized from the last, unpunctuated and fragmented, sentence, "A way a lone a last a loved a long the", alluding to the cyclical nature of everything in which the beginning and the end are fluid and one in the same and all things go to the place from which they've come -- if it can be considered iwagumi, is only by happenstance.

I started with a forest theme in mind for this tank; low light ferns and mosses. Something easy to maintain that I could grow out slowly without CO2, high light, and the subsequent frequent trimmings.

On the way back from AFA after picking up the tank, however, I wandered into the bonsai store around the corner. There I found the rocks you see in this tank (save the one from Riven) for eight dollars. As I found them to be intriguing, the forest theme -- which would require a different type of rock and at least one piece of driftwood -- was abandoned on the spot.

It's here where I start to answer your question. (Sorry for the rambling to get to this point.)

Here's the thing:
When I'm setting up a hardscape, I don't look Mother Nature in the eye for inspiration. At least not directly in the eye. I'd estimate that my process is three times removed from the source.
Amano looks to the source, Mother Nature, for inspiration.
His vision has since been refined by all of our interpretations of his interpretations to become the tanks we see on TPT and elsewhere.
I, in turn, interpret what I see all of you do and filter it through my own aesthetic sensibilities to come up with what ever you see me create.
Three degrees of separation from the source.

I see this hobby as an art of limitations. We are limited by the size of the tank, the hardscape materials on hand, fauna, and, most felt and frustrating, flora. (After all, who in this hobby has not at one time or another thought, I wish there were a plant that grew like this and was this color.?) In this hobby, we're forced to work within the confines of these limitations and make the best tank that we can.

So it was with riverrun. I had these stones and I studied each one for a couple of hours. Relying on my experience with all the other tanks I've done, I chose the rocks I thought best suited to a single-plant hardscape. (At this point, I knew I wanted to use UG again.) Having selected the rocks, I further studied them to determine their best side and how I could show their best sides when placed all together. (This often requires that I sacrifice one stone's best side so as to better accentuate another.)

The end result was only moderately successful in that all supporting stones are too small and will be buried by grown-in UG, but I did some things here that hopefully will compensate for that. (For example, the left-hand flat rock is very wide. Where there will be little vertical rock presence, the space it creates in the carpet floor will be a cool effect, I'm hoping. Where the rock's physical presence is not as important as the space it creates in the carpet.)

It was only until after I studied all the stones, laid them down in the tank, and planted the UG that I saw that it looked a bit like waves crashing on a shoreline or water flowing down a mountainside.

Mother Nature was not even considered consciously until well after the fact.

So for me, what I'm trying to create is something that looks pretty and feels right. Both are equally important. Beauty and emotion.

As I stated earlier, riverrun is not an iwagumi. It has many of the characteristics that X described, but in my mind it is decidedly not iwagumi. Mainly because in any tank I make, I want to always reserve the right and ability to change a 'scape on the fly without adhering to rules and guidelines laid out by others before me. I do not, for example, want to be told that I broke a rule by having an even number of rocks instead of an odd number. Because truth be told, sometimes given the size and shape of a collection of stones, the even number may actually look better than the odd. I understand the concept behind having an odd number, but philosophy and beauty do not always walk hand in hand, and I would rather hold the hand of beauty.

My tanks are an abstract interpretation of nature filtered through limitations inherent in the hobby, self-expression, and reactions to tanks done by others that either inspire or frustrate me.

I think that's pretty much it. It also a lot more complicated and simple, but I've already rambled on far too long.

Thanks, and good question, pu

[Tex Gal]

This is such a great tank. I love all yours!

[Ugly Genius]

Thanks, Tex.
Right back at 'cha. I can't imagine seeing your 125 in person. It's beautiful! You have a gift for colors and textures that reveals to me just how much more I have to learn in this hobby 'cause I ain't even close to your level.

[Ugly Genius]

Some angled shots....

...to spice things up, you know.

[CL]

Wow, incredible! That ug has grown super fast! I love the scape too
Your best rockscape so far, IMO

[Ugly Genius]

Hey, thanks, cl! We'll see how well the rockscape fills in once I fill it. I'm a bit fearful that some of my supporting stones are too low, but I'll cross that bridge, so to speak, when I get to it.

(Missed having you around, bro. Got worried we lost you to NaClH2O.)

[CL]

Originally Posted by Ugly Genius

(Missed having you around, bro. Got worried we lost you to NaClH2O.)

lol, I'll never give up my planted tanks
For Christmas I might buy myself a 60P along with the full high tech gear

[amphirion]

one question. how are you managing to grow UG on the rocks? is that UG on the rocks? how do you manage to keep it from drying out?
---i just realized that was 3.

[Ugly Genius]

Your three questions in one can be replied to with one answer. It's Java Moss.
It there half by accident, half by experimentation. I had some there in the previous incarnation of this tank and removed most of it during the rescape, but some stayed on. I'm keeping it there as I want to see what it's like to grow moss emersed.