The artwork "The Garden in the Machine" by Jesper Just is a digital installation comprising film and sound. The piece is designed for the facade of Filmby Aarhus' building, where it is projected every day. The piece is connected to a pine tree planted on the rooftop terrace in front of Filmbyen 11. Sensors on the tree continuously measure its growth, photosynthesis, water absorption, and more. These readings are translated into data, which manifest visually in a film played on the building's facade. Therefore, it is the tree that acts as the editor of the film, constituting the artwork. When the color scheme changes in the digital forest that pans across the building, it signifies that the organic tree is alive and thriving. In this manner, data from the living tree influences the digitized forest in the film.
The artwork is an interpretation of a digital garden, focusing on the relationship between humans and nature. It offers the experience of panning across a forest in a harbor environment, where materials such as metal, glass and steel primarily dominate.
'' In our society, we are no longer taught to distinguish between plants and trees. My point is that our general knowledge about nature is steeply declining, resulting in an increasing loss of our own existential understanding. I want to push humans out of the center we so often take for granted, especially in Western culture, and instead shed light on the role plants plays in our ecosystem." - Jesper Just