2nd Place at the Biophysical Society's annual Art of Science competition in 2024 went to Benjamin Stottrup for this stunning image - "Every breath you take is possible because of lung surfactant. Lung surfactant makes these intricate and beautiful patterns that vary with composition and surface pressure. This image was taken by confocal fluorescence microscopy. Sample composition is 9:1 (4:1 r:racDPPC):hexadecanol with 1.5 mol% dehydrocholesterol."

https://www.biophysics.org/awards-funding/image-contest#/

This image of a rodent optic nerve head showing astrocytes (yellow), contractile proteins (red) and retinal vasculature (green) by Hassanain Qambari and Jayden Dickson won first place at the 2023 NSW Photomicrography competition.

https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/2023-photomicrography-competition/rodent-optic-nerve-head

An art collective that creates immersive multimedia pieces about non-human subjectivity. I'm posting the TED talk bc when I looked, noting they had online seemed to be designed for online consumption, it's all exhibits. I hope one day they make work intended to be consumed at home and not just in a few galleries a world away. Their ideas/approaches seem very powerful.

The processes of erosion and subsequent sediment deposition can produce some very intriguing and visually staggering imagery, whether on a small scale, or visible from satellites, as presented here.

Wherever there is nature, you will never be far from Art.

https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2023/10/dan-coe-lidar-rivers/

https://susancarlson.com/2023/10/19/susan-carlson-throwback-thursday-winfrieda-the-lace-polar-bear-returns-to-fly-on-the-wall/

See also:

The Animal Kingdom in Quilts and Textiles: https://www.neqm.org/animalia-details

One of the most amazing things about Art which is meant to change within an environment as the environment changes, is the cumulative effects that change can have, when viewed over a long period of time. This artwork was meant to archive that change, as that change transformed the work of art.

It's important to revisit works like these, to get in touch with the passing of time in beautiful new ways.

https://www.deseret.com/entertainment/2020/4/7/21207816/spiral-jetty-50-robert-smithson-nancy-holt-anniversary-dia-umfa-great-salt-lake-landmarks-utah

Kim's work resulted in this beautiful image, which won 2nd place in the annual "Art of Science" image contest hosted by the Biophysical Society, in 2013!

https://www.biophysics.org/Portals/0/BPSAssets/Awards/ImageContest/

Sediment deposition/erosion is a natural process that produces some breath-taking imagery! Many thanks to Brian for this newest work!

This image was captured by Differential Interference Contrast by Dr. Lynn Boatner et al of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA for the 2003 NSW competition, where it placed 15th. ...But of course I will hone in on it because it looks so much like a landscape!

https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/2003-photomicrography-competition/surface-of-titanium-carbide-crystal

This painting was a salvage operation, from the moment when I discovered that my gesso had been replaced by a cheap impostor wearing the same bucket. The gesso cracked and fell away from the masonite, and I almost gave up on this painting - and painting in general. I didn't though, and just applied more gesso over what was left in this painting. The end result was definitely an interesting surface to apply pigment to, resembling a rocky coastline where a few puzzle-pieces of gesso held on.

My work has always attempted to echo nature, by applying some of the same processes that nature uses - in this case sediment deposition (in addition to fractal field applications), to reproduce alluvial fans, river deltas, and other g

Submitted to the Nikon photomicrography competition in 1990, this entry won 4th place. In addition to just being a lovely piece, it has the distinctive signs of nature repeating herself - this time in the form of an alien desert landscape! And THAT, is a tell-tale sign that some natural process art is afoot!

https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/1990-photomicrography-competition/thin-slab-of-brazilian-agate

The more I look at these, the more I'm taken by the feeling that what I'm looking at was not only formed by nature, but colonized by nature in a seemingly random way that has a mind of its own - apart from the artist. It is this "mind" that creates a lot of natural process art, and as an artist I can tell you that it is a joy and a wonder to work with, once you can forge a relationship with it.

I do not think that this particular artist copies mold colonial distribution exactly, mapping them all out using mathematical coordinates, but there's an overall feeling that says "this is natural", not a placement that feels labored over, or over-considered, and that requires an artist for which the natural world, its preservation and presentation, is more important than the ego, or the will of the artist.

I can highly respect that.

![](https://lazysoci.al/a

This entry from the 2013 competition won first place, and in spite of its rather pixelated appearance, it is indeed fascinating, and visually intriguing! It was created by using fluorescence microscopy imaging, and shows "alterations in the morphology of Dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine (DPPC) monolayers at an air/water interface due to extended exposure (8 days) to carbon nanodiamond particles. The images show discrete dark liquid condensed phase domains in a continuous bright liquid expanded phase due to interactions with the carbon nanoparticles."

...I couldn't have said it better, myself.

https://www.biophysics.org/awards-funding/image-contest#/

This image won first place in the NSW photomicrography competition, in 1990. Looking at the other entries from that year, the competition seemed to be fairly stiff. I will most definitely be posting some more images from that year!

This particular image was produced by Richard H. Lee of Argonne National Laboratory in Argonne, Illinois, and looks for all the world like a fish rising to the surface of the water to me.

https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/1990-photomicrography-competition/crystals-evaporated-from-solution-of-magnesium-sulfate-and-tartaric-acid