Before reaching Turbulence 2025, visitors pass through some of Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s most peaceful sights: koi gliding through the still waters of the Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden, cherry blossoms catching the breeze, birdsong mixing with the laughter of children, and the steady splash of the Magnolia Plaza fountain. Past the limestone administration building by McKim, Mead & White, that tranquility gives way to something more unsettling. In the Plant Family Collection, two mirrored structures rise from the greenery. They emit slow, high-pitched tones that hover between serene and haunting. This is Turbulence 2025, a site-specific installation by Suchi Reddy that quietly disrupts its surroundings.
Commissioned by the Garden, the work stands eight feet tall and five feet wide. Made from reflective metal panels that shift with the wind, it distorts the landscape as visitors pass through. Layered sound deepens the effect, creating a sense of unease and motion. The installation gestures toward the invisible forces of environmental change—present but often ignored.
“Turbulence 2025 is a work about listening to our environments—deeply, emotionally, and biologically,” Reddy said. “It’s about attuning to the distress signals of a living world under strain.”
Reddy was inspired by scientists Lilach Hadany and Yossi Yovel, whose research suggests that stressed plants emit sounds beyond the range of human hearing, distinct acoustic signatures that differ by species and by stressors like dry soil. To reflect this idea, Reddy collaborated with composer and sound designer Malloy James to create a soundscape that plays from the two structures. The sounds are subtle, atmospheric tones that are both calming and slightly disquieting.
Based in New York, Reddy is an architect and designer whose work explores how the brain processes art and beauty. She founded her studio, Reddymade, in 2002 around the idea that “form follows feeling.” That principle is central to Turbulence 2025, which relies on sensory disruption to provoke an emotional rather than purely intellectual response. For an installation in the National Building Museum, Reddy’s mantra came to fruition as hanging mirrored objects designed to evoke thought and emotion among visitors.
“Suchi Reddy’s Turbulence 2025 encapsulates the Garden’s vision of fostering deep connections between people and the natural world,” added Brooklyn Botanic Garden president Adrian Benepe. “This work bridges art, science, and environmental awareness in a way that is both poetic and powerful. It reminds us that even in stillness, there is movement—and even in beauty, there is urgency.”
Turbulence 2025 is on view at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden through October 26.
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