Flowering Bonsai & Dissolving Boundaries

It’s a little strange to see such prominent deadwood on an azalea. But then boundaries between acceptable and strange are dissolving in the world of bonsai as they seem to be almost everywhere. A year ago we posted some photos from the 2015 Uneo Satsuki Azalea Festival. Now we’ve got some from the 2016 festival that we lifted from a video by hermanbaik. Most were blown up to fit our format, thus the fuzz. Still, the brilliance of the trees and their flowers can’t help but shine through. More conventional to be sure, but there was a time not too … Continue reading Flowering Bonsai & Dissolving Boundaries

Root Over by Robert

Robert Steven has done it again. This time it’s a perfect root-over-rock bonsai (I couldn’t find the variety). Here’s what Charles Bevan has to say about it: “This is unbelievably perfect. One quick glance at this tree brought me to a state of nirvana.” The three trees shown here are from Robert Steven’s timeline. No varieties given, and though we would rather know what they are, we can still enjoy simple bonsai beauty, with or without a name. Even though we don’t know what the trees are, one thing we do know about this forest planting is that it is … Continue reading Root Over by Robert

Bonsai Brilliance at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Cork bark Chinese elm in full fall brilliance at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. You don’t see that many good Chinese elm bonsai. I like this one a lot; its color, the heavy trunk with its corky bark, the handsome Tokoname pot. This photo and the others in this post are from the bonsai collection on the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens website. With the exception of the Trident maple root-over-rock just below, and some re-writing to bring things up to date, the rest of this post appeared back in December 2013. Though I haven’t been there for a long time, I think … Continue reading Bonsai Brilliance at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Bonsai Art & Free Flowing Information

Root-over-rock Trident maple by Wolfgang Putz. The photo is from Bonsai Master on facebook as are all three photos in this post. Here are a couple earlier posts on Wolfgang’s bonsai (from May, 2009 and from August 2012). All three of these photos are from someone called Bonsai Master (facebook). When I saw them, I was struck by three things: 1. All three are excellent bonsai. 2. The quality of the photos is also excellent. It make a big difference when people go to the trouble to take a good shot. Facebook (but not just facebook) is overflowing with poorly … Continue reading Bonsai Art & Free Flowing Information

360 Degree Bonsai (Second Try)

This front view of a root-over-rock Trident maple is one of a whole series of views you can enjoy on the Northern Ireland Bonsai Society website. We had some problems with links to the version of this when we posted it yesterday. My guess is that the degree mark in 360° Bonsai is the issue, so we change the title to 360 Degree Bonsai. We won’t know if it works until we actually post it, so please don’t panic if you see what looks like the same post twice. Back in pioneering days of this blog, we posted an image … Continue reading 360 Degree Bonsai (Second Try)

360 Degree Bonsai

This front view of a root-over-rock Trident maple is one of a whole series of views you can enjoy on the Northern Ireland Bonsai Society website. Back in pioneering days of this blog, we posted an image of a Satsuki azalea that was taken from a site that showed it in a way that seemed unique at the time; 360 degrees of spinning bonsai splendor. We couldn’t and still can’t show that here (WordPress is pretty basic), so we showed a couple still shots, offered a link (unfortunately no longer live) and moved on. Four and one half years later, … Continue reading 360 Degree Bonsai

Bonsai & Some Great Stories Unearthed

This photo is originally from the from Kokufu-ten 47 (1973) and came to us via Owen Reich’s Bonsai Unearthed. We’ve been discussing root-on-rock bonsai lately, and by extension root-over-rock bonsai, and you must admit that this is a worthy and very unusual example of the latter (I’ll guess that it’s a Trident maple). Also, when have you ever seen a companion plant quite as large as this one? It’s about time we featured Owen Reich (an apprentice and instructor in Japan whose name came up in our last post). After all, it’s rare to find someone who knows his (or … Continue reading Bonsai & Some Great Stories Unearthed

More Root-on-Rock Bonsai & What’s the Difference?

This is what can happen when you have a great rock and excellent plant material to work with (a little skill doesn’t hurt either). It’s by Norboru Kaneko, from our Masters’ Series Juniper book. Last post we featured the development of a root-on-rock planting by Norboru Kaneko from our Masters’ Series Juniper book. Here are two more of his plantings (top and bottom) plus one from Andolfo Bonsai for your enjoyment. If you search for root-on-rock bonsai, what you’ll find, with a few exceptions, are root-over-rock bonsai. I suspect the reason for this is that root-over-rock, though they take longer, … Continue reading More Root-on-Rock Bonsai & What’s the Difference?

Change Your Plans

Sometimes it’s helpful to break a bonsai down into its constituent parts. What you might see in this case, is a somewhat classical root-over-rock Trident maple bonsai accentuated by two rather long, undulating branches on either side. For some of us, there might be a temptation to cut them off; to revert to something safer and more recognizable as bonsai. Don’t do it! The photo is from the National Bonsai Foundation’s 2013 calendar. Mr. California Juniper at the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum. The event is the annual Potomac Bonsai Festival which happens to be coming up this weekend (May … Continue reading Change Your Plans

Japanese Whites

A seedling? Great base, strong taper and nice balanced open branching. An altogether excellent Japanese white pine and it’s from a seedling no less! As you may know, most quality Japanese white pine bonsai have been grafted onto Black pine stock (see below). But not this one. It was grown from seed and is, as you can see, quite impressive. It was just wired (in this photo) by Michael Hagedorn (Crataegus Bonsai.) It belongs to a client of Micheal’s. More than just another bonsai in our species specific series. The Japanese white pine (Pinus parviflora) is one of the world’s … Continue reading Japanese Whites