With a keen interest in technology and art, Tanvir Nagore, Mehdi Saajid, and Trilok Chander are presenting an immersive showcase of new media art at Goethe Zentrum, Hyderabad. The exhibition ‘Synchronised Spectrum: How Bees See Flowers’ brings together varied facets of the city - Cyberabad and its technological strides and the cultural ethos of the Old City.
The trio believes that art can be fun when it offers visitors an interactive experience rather than passively viewing a painting or a sculpture. On one wall of the Hamburg Hall at Goethe Zentrum is a large installation featuring rows of illuminated floral structures on a panel. Mehdi explains that this “digital kinetic sculpture” will help humans view flowers the way bees do.
To understand the idea behind this installation, we have to recall science lessons. Bees have compound eyes composed of thousands of tiny lenses called Ommatidia. “These lenses work together to create a mosaic , which allows bees to see a wider field of view than humans. Bees can see flowers in ultraviolet light that is not visible to the human eye. The digital kinetic sculpture will replicate that vision for humans,” Mehdi explains. Tanvir elaborates that facilitating humans to “be a bee” and look at flowers in a different light will help further the understanding of how flowers evolved to attract certain bees.
