Dansk ukrudt og kunstig intelligens, "Danish Weeds and Artificial Intelligence"

The jury honors “Danish Weeds and Artificial Intelligence” by Frederick Rickmann as a rare and resonant work that expands our understanding of biodiversity beyond the purely biological and into the cultural and technological landscapes that increasingly shape it.

Emerging from the author’s daily walks through Bygholm Park, this project transforms a simple, attentive practice into a layered exploration of how we see, name, and value the living world. In doing so, it elevates the overlooked—those resilient “weeds” that thrive in the margins—into central protagonists in a broader ecological narrative.

The jury is particularly struck by the work’s ability to bridge domains that are too often treated as separate: the organic and the artificial, the spontaneous and the designed. By placing wild urban flora in dialogue with artificial intelligence and generative architectural processes, Rickmann proposes a compelling new “flora” for the 21st century—one that acknowledges that biodiversity today unfolds not only in soils and seeds, but also in code, systems, and human perception.

With poetic clarity and intellectual ambition, the book invites us to reconsider what constitutes nature, and how emerging technologies might deepen—rather than diminish—our sensitivity to it. It is both a meditation and a method: a way of observing that insists on interconnectedness and challenges hierarchical distinctions between what is cultivated and what is dismissed.

For its originality, its cross-disciplinary vision, and its subtle yet powerful reframing of biodiversity as a shared space between humans, machines, and spontaneous life, the jury is proud to recognize “Danish Weeds and Artificial Intelligence” as a deserving recipient of the GDA Biodiversity Award 2026.