Art is a way for us to make sense of the world. The story about why art helps plants grow is just one of many ways in which we try to understand our place in the universe.
Art is an attempt to make the world more comprehensible and meaningful, and it has the side effect of helping plants grow. Other attempts include religion, science, and telling stories. Perhaps understanding this will help us all make better art, and have more beautiful gardens.
As a plant lover and an artist, how can I say no to this? So I decided to conduct an experiment and see if art really makes plants grow.
I chose three types of plants- two flowering plants and one green plant. One of the flowering plants was a gerbera daisy. The other flowering plant was a red rose. The green plant was a pothos ivy.
The gerbera daisy just blossomed today, about 5 days after it was planted. The red rose is growing very fast and has many leaves on it already. The pothos ivy is now more than half the size that it originally was when I bought it at WalMart for $2.00! It has been about 10 days since I planted it.
It seems that art does make plants grow faster!! This is why we have paintings in our homes and offices, to make our environment better! Plants definitely need art too!
Art does not simply beautify; art makes the garden grow and thrive. But, what is it about art that causes plants to grow?
We are just beginning to understand how art and plants intertwine. In the past, horticulturists thought that art in gardens was ornamental and nothing more. With this belief, they could dismiss art as a frivolous addition to gardening. Now we know that art has a positive impact on plant growth.
Art affects plants by supplying them with more light, carbon dioxide, water and nutrition than plants get in nature. The effects of art on plant growth were observed by Vallenet in 1871 when he found that a canvas painted with flowers increased the growth rate of an adjacent flowerbed by 26%. Since then, many experiments have been conducted to determine if the influence of art on plant growth has a positive or negative effect on the health of plants.
The outcome of these experiments has shown that growing in an environment that contains art has a positive effect on the size, weight and height of plants. In one study conducted in France, scientists found out that Belvedere Phlox grown next to abstract paintings grew larger than those grown next to images of geometric figures or landscapes. Another study concluded that hanging abstract paintings above tomato
In the fall of 2012, I was invited by Google to do a talk with their staff. In preparation, I did a lot of research on the role of art in corporate culture. There is a lot of information available on that subject, and it all seemed very positive. Art makes people more productive, makes them happy and generally improves the quality of life in corporations.
Why shouldn’t companies and schools have more art? It seems so obvious that if you want happy employees, you just get them some nice pictures to look at. I was expecting to hear people talking about how Google incorporated art into their offices. But what I heard was a shocking revelation: Google has no art in their offices.
“We don’t believe in art,” said one of the Googlers proudly. “It doesn’t make your employees any happier,” he continued, pointing to a study someone had done, “and it doesn’t help productivity.” The other Googlers nodded in agreement.
The slides I saw during the presentation made me question whether those researchers had actually done their homework. Having seen the benefits first hand on my farm, I am here to argue that art is not only good for your company; it’s good for your plants as well!
David Cho is an artist and a science communicator. He works both in fine art, primarily sculptural work done in wood, as well as commercial work using a variety of media.
David Cho’s website: http://davidchoart.com/
David Cho on Twitter: http://twitter.com/davidchoart
David Cho on Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/David-Cho
Art and science are not two different things, they are two different ways of looking at the same thing. Art is a way of communicating an idea to someone else. Science is a way of proving an idea to yourself.
Art is a way of creating something that does not exist in nature. Science is a way of observing something that does exist in nature.
Art is the creation of beauty, whereas science is the observation of truth. Beauty and truth do not have to be mutually exclusive, but I think the general rule holds true.
When I look at art I see many different fields of study: psychology, sociology, history, biology etc. When I look at science I see one field: mathematics
Art and science have been in conflict for a long time. The conflict is between creativity and discipline. Art demands that you break the rules, that you find your own voice, that you express yourself. Science demands that you follow the rules, that you adhere to established methods, and above all else, that you be objective.
The conflict is between imagination and rationalism. Art is an expression of your imagination, science a product of rational thought. It’s easy to see why art and science are in conflict: they both want your attention, but they want it for different reasons.
Art wants your attention so you can express yourself; science wants your attention so you can be objective.
