This wildly elaborate juniper bonsai is from Bjorn Bjornholm’s facebook photos. It’s a case where a darker background would work better, but borrowers can’t be choosey. Here Bjorn’s caption: “Procumbens wired and ready for its trip to Tokyo.”
When I saw the photo above my first thought was… it’s been a while since we did a post on eccentric bonsai, so why not?
On reflection however, the whole notion of eccentric is called into question. This has a lot to do with the sudden spread of bonsai throughout the world and the cross pollination made possible by easy travel and the internet, resulting in experimental approaches and outcomes that may have been highly unusual a few years ago, but not so much any more.
So you can call these trees whatever you like; eccentric, unusual, exciting, compelling, daring, or just bonsai as usual in the 21st century.
Bjorn Bjornholm has been studying under contemporary Japanese bonsai master Keiichi Fujikawa in Ikeda City just north of Osaka, Japan since 2008. He is also the co-founder and co-instructor of the Fujikawa International School of Bonsai. Bjorn’s trees have been featured several times here on Bonsai Bark.
An eccentric base and trunk combined with a highly stylized crown. Based on the long narrow trunk you might be tempted to call this tree a literati, but I think the thick robust crown belies the notion of rugged survivor hanging onto to life on some remote mountainside.
This rather unusual ‘3 trees in one’ Shimpaku has a loose relaxed, unfinished feel that helps make it accessible to us ordinary people.
Here’s Bjorn’s caption: One of my favorite shimpaku I’ve wired thus far. We named it ‘ganmen hiji uchi.’ Any guesses on the translation?
Kimura’s legacy?
Kimura….
I looked up the translation of ‘ganmen hiji uchi’ which seems to be a martial arts movement and ‘elbow strike’ is what I found – which describes the Shimpaku really well. The way the one trunk curves around, then crosses the main trunk and ends up pointing in the opposite direction looks just like an arm being bent ready to dig into someone’s middle.
However my favourite is the triple trunk/triple tree Shimpaku. I wonder what its’ name is (assuming it’s one of Bjorn’s trees too).
Hi Ann,
Thanks for your research. Your translation and explanation makes good sense.
As far the comment that these are Bjorn’s trees, I’m not sure about that, though I don’t know the whole story. My guess is that these are trees that Bjorn has worked on but belong Keiichi Fujikawa, Bjorn’s teacher.