[Robert Hudson]

This reminds me of the one he did trying to recreate a volcanoe...or is this the same one? It is a great looking hill, great detail and composition on the hill itself, but I can not buy into the open, empty, white sand around it. It certainly does not look natural, and to me it is to distracting. My eye keeps getting pulled away from the plants to the white sand. I can see it is not meant to look natural. It is meant to look different and I can appreciate that effort to be unique, but it doesn't do anything for me.

 

[Robert Hudson]

Well, I guess again I will be percieved as being the bad guy for voicing lone dissent! That is the thing about art, it is totally open to personal interpretation. When I look at Rickys pic here, I think more of an oasis in a dessert than an island in water. But I also keep thinking how cool it would look surrounded by dwarf hairgrass. Sorry!

 

[Robert Hudson]

I get it! Honestly I do. I guess I just don't appreaciate it. I will say one thing, Ricky appears to be the first person seriously trying to incorporate abstract and symbolic art into the aquarium. I am just more of a traditionilist I suppose.

There would be more sutle ways of emphasising the island and still make it more natural looking. Instead of a bare substrate there could be an array of rocks and wood intermixed with little sparse tufts of hairgrass or something along that line. It is engaging to look at though. Every time I go back and look at it I see something I hadn't noticed before.

The japanese one that Carlos shows above I am not real crazy about either, but it looks more natural. Even with bare substrate showing.