Japanese Artist Launches Plants Into Space

Tokyo based artist Makoto Azuma, for his latest project titled "Exobiotanica”, teamed with Sacramento-based JP Aerospace - a volunteer-based organization that constructs and sends vessels into orbit, to launch a Japanese white pine bonsai and an arrangement of flowers into the stratosphere. Using Styrofoam and a very light metal frame, the team created two devices to attach the 50-year-old bonsai and the flowers, which were then launch separately using Helium balloons. Azuma attached still cameras and six Go Pro video cameras tied in a ball to record the trip into the stratosphere.

”I wanted to see the movement and beauty of plants and flowers suspended in space,” Azuma later explained T Magazine. After both pieces went up, Azuma embraced his team warmly and smiled. “I always wanted to travel to space,” he said. “This is a dream come true.”