The true nature of Nature Aquarium and Diorama Aquarium

In recent times, one of the most striking questions I found myself making is related to the actual differences between Nature Aquarium and Diorama Aquarium. Yes, I am doing explicitly this splitting between the two because they differ in the very roots of aquascaping, which are utterly ignored when considering both types of works. You may ask many hobbyists around, even professionals, and you will find rarely a coherent or clear answer about what separates both branches.

The reason why this happens is because, historically speaking, the Diorama Aquarium has emerged as a splint of Nature Aquarium, which has grown up to overpass in popularity to his former discipline. This splint has evolved so much in the basics of the Nature Aquarium that they are no longer connected.

The Spirit of Amano

As probably many of you already know, last days have been times of turmoil for the international community in Aquascaping. Unfortunately, apparently there have been a number of cases of breach of rules of various contests, with the subsequent disqualifications of those participants in some of them. I am sure those disqualifications will continue for the remaining of this 2020 season of contests, as result of those events.

However, I do not want to linger in this article in what happened or not, nor mention individuals or organisations involved into that. Instead, I prefer to discuss about the context and what this means for Aquascaping.

Blog - Slow Scaping: Recovering the true love for Nature Aquarium

It has been awhile since my last entry in this page. However, I have been far from idle in this period, busy developing a large project I am working on, but also putting lot of thinking about Aquascaping in general. This has been an important period of maturation, which has brought me some new thoughts and understanding. I am a strong follower of the principles set by Takashi Amano, and probably as many others, I have done lot of search in his words and works, always trying to disentangle his mastery of Aquascaping. Amano has been inspiration for many, but he has always been cryptic about his philosophy. Probably, this was intentional, so to allow others open their own paths, him being just a portal to access to this new world of understanding about Nature.

But regardless this desire of Amano for making Nature Aquarium grow in the community and spread, opening new ways, I have been feeling that the message was, somewhat, distorted. And that, it was a matter of worrisome for me. As the master passed away, it is now up to us, as community, as lovers of this hobby (or form of art), to preserve the message for the future. But seeing the dominant forms of Aquascaping since his death, I really feel is being lost. Still present, as many use his lessons about Nature to make their works, but at the same time, evolved into something entirely new but missing authenticity.

Takashi Amano - A life of passion, a story of love for Nature

Dear readers,

Today is a bit sad day. Today, it is the first anniversary of the death of Takashi Amano, creator of the Nature Aquarium concept, founder of ADA, and more important than that: an artist who many of us, aquascapers, consider the Master and the one who truly captured the spirit of Nature in his creations. The social media is commemorating this day by posting the comments people did on the day that mankind lost this genius. I was really touched by his passing away, and I felt compelled to express it to my friends, family and close people that I have in my social network. I did it with the following words:

Presentation

Dear reader, 

First of all, thank you very much for investing your time in this site. At the moment, I am working in all the layouts and basic contents, so it will take a while until more useful information and details can be found here.

The Living Tank has three major goals: