The work of Ulrike Gärtner (Gemany/Dresden)offers microcosms of an entirely different kind, realms of carefully constructed stability. Her sparse garden islands relate to the idea of Zen gardens and their capacity to represent world and landscape by extremely reduced means. The Chinese symbol Ku-O, a square, forms thereby the formal and substantial metaphor for a restricted area which even despite its restriction gives way for an overview of larger coherence and helps to overcome the individual feeling of being lost.