Before, During and After

After. A very unusual tree with three trunks merging into one thicker trunk (you can just see a small piece of the third trunk). You could say the reviled RT word (reverse taper) but who cares? By Juan Andrade. From facebook.

Just couldn’t pass this one up. This Japanese white pine transformation is so unusual and the result so striking and unique, that… well, you can see for yourself.

The artist, Juan Andrade is one of a whole host of young apprentices who are studying or have studied in Japan. At least one other bonsai by Juan has appeared on Bark (see below). The before, during and after (antes, durante y después) photos are from a photo album on facebook.

The progression. It’s clear that plenty happens that you can’t see. For example, how on earth did he get the left trunk to cooperate? Guess you’ll just have to use your imagination.

 

Before. From this to what you see above is no mean feat. There’s that pesky bowed out left trunk for starters, but clearly there’s much more.

 

During. Still in the same pot, but leaned over.

 

Una Acacia es una Acacia en en cualquier idioma. Es de un sitio web llamado Bonsai en Costa Rica. El Artisto es Juan Andrade. From Bonsai Bark, February 2012.

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Which Is Which?

Don’t read this until you have looked at the all the photos first to see if you can tell which are bonsai and which are simulations. After that you can read this caption and the rest of the text. Ravaged by time but still dignified. By Robert Steven and the great outdoors. From facebook.

Without reading the captions, can you tell which images are bonsai simulations and which are photos of bonsai?

A distinction worth making is between Robert Steven’s actual bonsai and his bonsai simulations that periodically appear on this blog. Simulations that are so realistic that it’s difficult to tell one from an actual bonsai. Though the artist’s eyes and vision are the same, the media are radically different. So different that you could say that Robert is a master of two art forms; bonsai and digital simulations.

 

A simulation or…? All of Robert’s simulations that appear on Bark are from actual bonsai that are submitted for critique.

 

This barely tamed savage beast lives where nature and the bonsai artist meet. From Roberts’s facebook photos.

 

One advantage to a simulation is that you can do anything you want. Including things you couldn’t do with a real tree. However, if you view any of Robert’s simulations next to the actual trees, you can see that he stays within the bounds of the possible. That includes this one.

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Searching for an Adjective & Upcoming Bonsai Events

I’m searching for the perfect adjective for this monumental (towering, preternatural, massive, magnificent, imposing…) planting. It’s from the World Bonsai Friendship Federation Convention that is taking place in China right now (Sept 24-28). I found the photo on Bill Valavanis’ excellent new blog. Bill is there and has posted a series of great shots from the event.

FREE ADVERTISING! Would you like to see your bonsai event featured here? If so, just send me a notice with a link to the event. That’s it. But remember, no link, no show. My email is wayne@stonelantern.com. You might also want to mention the event in the comments below.

 

Oct 4-6: Montreal has two excellent permanent bonsai collections (Japanese and Chinese) at their famous Botanical Garden (Jardin botanique). When you throw a big bonsai event into the mix, it looks like a trip well worth taking. BTW: that’s a very good example of a collected Northern white cedar (Thuja occidentalis). My guess is that it came from the rocky escarpments near the tree line way up north.

 

This ancient Swiss Stone pine belongs to Walter Pall. Walter is one the of headliners at the upcoming South Africa event. Just to see Walter in action would be enough reason to go… but there’s much more to sweeten the pot.

Oct 24 – 27: South Africa Bonsai Association Convention 2013 is being hosted by Eastern Bonsai Societies (EBS) and features our Michael Hagedorn, the inimitable Walter Pall and Rob Kepinski.

 

Shimpaku juniper by Suthin Sukosolvisit. You can enjoy Suthin’s world class bonsai skills (and his world class personality) at the upcoming GSBG Convention.

 

Oct 31 – Nov 2: Golden State Bonsai Federation Convention XXXVI—Bonsai Artist Studio: OUTSIDE THE BOX. I think you’ll kick yourself if you miss this one. Especially if you live within a few thousand miles of Los Angeles (most def if you live within a few hundred miles). A very big part of the reason why is the impressive list of headliners: Dave DeGroot, Suthin Sukosolvisit, Peter Warren, Mauro Stemberger, Kathy Shaner, Tom Elias and Sean Smith.

 

Nov 30 – Dec 1: Eda Uchi Kai Bonsai-Ten 2013 in Belgium. I know most of you can read Flemish, but just in case, here’s something in English about what promises to be a great bonsai event. The headliners are Kevin Willson (UK), Enrico Savini (IT), François Jeker (FR), Márcio Meruje and Viriato Oliveira from Portugal.

 

Dec 7-8: Even though we couldn’t find a link to the event on the NC Research site, I decided to go ahead with it because it’s a Bill Valavanis event and a great chance for our Southern bonsai brethren to see Bill in action.

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Boon Again

This magnificent juniper makes its rocky home in California’s Sierra Nevada range. This photo, and the next three photos, are from a recent series on Boon Manakitivipart’s facebook timeline titled “Sierra trip with Dylan, Toby and Freddie at Carson Pass.”

We’ve been featuring Boon Manakitivipart’s bonsai since Bonsai Bark’s earliest days. Not only is Boon a highly accomplished bonsai artist, he is teacher to several other accomplish bonsai artists (Michael Hagedorn immediately comes to mind). Equally important, Boon is a lover and photographer (along with some friends) of some of the Sierra Nevada’s most astounding trees.

 

 

Boon and half-man revisit an old friend (see below).

 

This Boon photo appeared in two early era (2009) Bark posts (here and here).

That’s Boon counting rings(?). This photo also appeared a 2009 Bark post. It was titled Boon’s Big Bonsai. You might notice that’s it’s a close-up of the third tree above.

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Double Take: A Snapshot In Time

One of the famous old ’Chabo-hiba’Hinoki cypress (Chamaecyparis obtusa, Chabo-hiba) at Boston’s Arnold Arboretum. This one was dates back to 1787 and it looks like it’s still in the original pot.

It’s been three weeks since we dug into our archives, so after putting up one post already this Sunday morning (our 20% to 25% off tool sale) I think it’s okay to take a small break. Besides, how many of you remember (or even saw) this post from two years ago?

Snapshot in time
The Larz Anderson Bonsai Collection (the first bonsai collection in North America that is still living), resides in Boston at Harvard’s Arnold Arboretum. Aside from the fact that it’s very old and the trees (some of them, at least) are still alive, this collection represents something quite unique; a living snapshot of Japanese bonsai from 100 years ago. Well almost; nothing living is static and the trees shown here are no exception. Over time, they continued to grown and mature and were pruned and repotted by a long line of curators. Still, as far as I know, no major restyling has taken place since the collection arrived in Boston in 1913, and much of the original look and feel of the trees remains from that time.

The Remarkable Journey of the Oldest Bonsai in America
If you’d like to dig into the history of the Larz Andersen collection, I heartily recommend this excellent article by Peter Del Tredici, former curator of the collection. You could also check out this Bonsai Bark post from last year, or, best of all, you could visit the Arnold Arboretum. It’s a trip worth making for anyone who loves trees, large or small.

 

Another old ’Chabo-hiba’Hinoki cypress in a well-chosen modern pot. Some of the pots have survived to this day, but many were lost due to freezing.


Japanese maple cultivar in fall color (though I like the choice of pots on the other trees shown here, I’m not so sure about this one).


Japanese white pine.


A piece of one of the original Hinokis that was saved after an uninvited split in the trunk. For the whole story see Peter Del Tredici’s article.


Slanting Hinoki cypress.

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Komsta Bonsai

Calligraphy anyone? I don’t know if calligraphy was on Mario Komsta’s mind when he styled this remarkable tree. I do know that there was a time when bonsai that looked like calligraphy was popular and that many scholars agree that bonsai was, in part at least, inspired by the calligraphy of the old Chinese masters (this is especially true of bunjin style bonsai). Of course you could say that nature created the long calligraphic stroke that helps make this tree so unique, but we don’t know what Mario removed or otherwise changed to enhance the effect.

We’ve been featuring the bonsai of Mario Komsta for several years now (the first time was way back in March 2009). There are a couple good reasons for this: first, Mario’s bonsai are exceptional, and second he regularly puts up quality photos of his trees on facebook (all of the photos in this post are from Mario’s facebook photos).

 

A break with convention? You don’t see that many bunjin with such dense foliage.

 

Though no size is given, judging by the leaves, I’d say this little elm qualifies as a shohin.

 

We’ve shown this muscular little hornbeam more than once before, but it’s worth another look.

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Not Shimpaku part 2

Maybe it’s not perfect, but given the limits of the variety (Jun procumbens ‘nana’), it’s pretty good. In fact, it’s one of the very best pro-nana I’ve seen. It belongs to Thomas J. Mozden, as do all but the last tree in this post. It’s from a 2009 contest that was held on The Art of Bonsai Project.

I was going to call this post Lone Star and feature the bonsai of Thomas Mozden who lives in Texas, but I got distracted along the way by the whole Juniper procumbens ‘nana’ question  (see our ‘Not Shimpaku’ post and comments from last week).

My interest was originally peaked because this tough little plant was North America’s pioneer bonsai (aka Mallsai). Yet, for some reason, you seldom see older specimen quality examples. I think this mostly has to do with lack of impressive trunk girth (yet there’s that one glaring exception – see below), but perhaps something else is holding pro-nana back?

There are other questions swirling around this all too common but still mysterious variety, but we’ll leave those to Wikipedia for the moment. Except to say that some are a sort of blue-grey-green and some are bright green or even bright yellowish green, and I’m not sure why. I am sure however, that Pro-nanas (aka Dwarf Japanese garden juniper) in addition to once being our most popular bonsai, makes a very attractive and weed-resistant ground cover for landscaping, especially the ones with the bright green tint.

This one has trunked up fairly well for a Pro-nana. It’s another Thomas Mozden tree that appears on the Art of Bonsai Project.

This one, also by Mr. Mozden, is from a contest that was held on the Art of Bonsai Project. The judges weren’t too excited about it (the unfinished looking soil surface no doubt didn’t help) but I think it has something. Some people might find that U-shaped curve a little problematic (those judges again) but it doesn’t bother me. A later more refined version of this little tree appears in our Not Shimpaku post from last week.

Unfinished potential. Nice overall shape and movement, but leaving foliage in front of the trunk’s base is very unusual and more than a little questionable. Is it hiding a flaw?  There are also other spots that might look better with a little less foliage. Speaking of, this tree shows very little immature foliage, which is also unusual . Healthy Pro-nanas tend to show almost all immature foliage.

Like the second tree above, this one also appeared in our recent ‘Not Shimpaku’ post as well as on a post from last year. Here’s the caption: “This one is from a 2012 Bark post. The tree resides at the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum. It’s listed as a Procumbens nana, though I’ve never seen a ‘nana’ with such a massive trunk. Which begs the question…” In other words, is it a Phoenix graft? If you look at the other side, it doesn’t look like one to me, but maybe your eyes are sharper than mine (you’ll find the back and the back story on a post from 2012).

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Ceramic Art Disguised as Bonsai Pots

Deciding which one of Horst Heinzlreiter’s pots to show as the lead photo seems almost random, considering Horst is so prolific and all of his pots are worthy. The same goes for the six pots below. Numerous others as just as good, but you have to stop somewhere (for a whole slew of Horst’s pots, check out this facebook post).

Sometimes it seems my function here is art curator (and sometimes art critic). I show you pictures of beautiful or unusual things (usually bonsai), make a few questionable comments and leave the rest to you. So here we go again, except this time the beautiful and unusual things are pots rather than bonsai.

More specifically, they are ceramic art by Horst Heinzlreiter cleverly disguised as bonsai pots. The question that arises when I see these is not ‘are they beautiful and unique’ (any fool can see that) but, were you to own one, would you show it alone? Or would you try to find that perfect tree for that perfect pot?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A little postscript: Turns out that this a timely post. Many of you are in, or entering into, your fall potting season. If you’re an experienced bonsai hand, you know that you can’t have enough good pots to choose from. Which brings us to the topic of our most excellent selection of Yixing bonsai pots (if can’t get your hands on any of Horst’s pots, Yixing just might be what you are looking for).

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NEW Bonsai Book

Finally! A new Tropical Bonsai book. By Pedro Morales, long-time professional bonsai grower, teacher and author.

If you live in the tropics or sub-tropics (much of Florida and southern California are sub-tropical), then you can enjoy a whole range of trees that the rest of us can enjoy only if we own a greenhouse, or if we have enough light (natural or artificial or both) and other positive conditions for growing indoor plants (good air circulation and some humidity don’t hurt). The best way to do this is to keep your tropical trees outdoors when temperatures allow and bring them indoors when it’s cold outside. I’ve been at it for years, with a whole range of varieties and have been especially successful with certain Ficus varieties and Kingsville boxwoods (not really tropical but highly adaptable). I’ve also have had some luck with several others, both tropical and some that most definitely are not tropical.

Because there are so many environments, both outdoors and indoors, the best approach might be to experiment until you find what works for you. Pedro Morale’s new Tropical Bonsai can, among other things, offer you some ideas to help make your bonsai experiments successful. You can purchase Tropical Bonsai and a whole range of other bonsai books and supplies at Stone Lantern.

Pedro Morales is no doubt one of the better known tropical bonsai mavens in the Americas, if not in the world. We won’t go into the entire list of his accomplishment, but it’s worth mentioning a couple high points: Pedro is one of only three people who have lectured at four of the six World Bonsai Conventions that have been held to date (he was also the Chairman of the 2009 World Bonsai Convention). He has also won a number of prestigious bonsai prizes and has traveled extensively to share his wisdom with bonsai lovers around the world. In addition to all this, Pedro owns and operates his Tropical Bonsai School and his nursery in Puerto Rico.

 

This will give you some idea of what to expect.

 

And another peek inside.


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