Bringing the Magic Up To Date

After. From a demo by Masahiko Kimura at the 11 ASPAC. (Asia Pacific Bonsai & Suiseki Convention) in Takamatsu Japan. It helps to start with great stock. It also helps to be Masahiko Kimura. Photo by Jonas Dupuich (Bonsai Tonight). Still magic after all these years Just in case might think that the not-so-old Master has lost his touch. It does help to start with great stock, but taking that great stock to the next level requires vision and a deft touch. Especially when the next level is accomplish in a single demonstration. Japanese demos and Western demos The photos … Continue reading Bringing the Magic Up To Date

Weekly Wire: Nifty Nebari, Bonsai Cloud & What Happened to Fresno?

Pemphis acidula by Gedemerta Bonsaibali. For a while now, facebook has been inundated with bonsai by Gedemerta. Turns out, that’s a good thing if you like exciting tropical bonsai. If you’re not friends on facebook, you can see more of Gede Merta’s trees on Beial blog (on facebook it’s Gedemerta; on Beial it’s Gede Merta). Bonsai from Scratch prizes Are there any winners out there who haven’t collected their prizes yet? If so, please contact me at wayne@stonelantern.com. Do you have an upcoming bonsai event that you want to promote? Let us know and we’ll publish it for you. wayne@stonelantern.com. … Continue reading Weekly Wire: Nifty Nebari, Bonsai Cloud & What Happened to Fresno?

A Bonsai Story

This famous old Japanese white pine appears on the cover of Bonsai Today 43 (below) and in the gallery section of our Pine book (Bonsai Today Masters’ Series Pines: Growing and Styling Japanese Black and White Pines). It originally appeared in Bonsai Today issue 31 where it is restyled by Japan’s most famous bonsai master, Masahiko Kimura and subsequently won the President’s Award at the 9th Taiken-ten Bonsai Exhibition. A revised version of this article later appears in The Magician, The Bonsai Art of Kimura 2. Back in good hands I stumbled upon the photo below in a 2009 post … Continue reading A Bonsai Story

Million Dollar Bonsai

This magnificent White pine was sold at the 11th Asia-Pacific Bonsai and Suiseki Convention & Exhibition in at Takamatsu, Kagawa, Japan, earlier this month. As you can see, the asking price was 100,000,000 yen (that’s close to 1.3 million dollars). I don’t know what the actual sales price was. Photo borrowed from Bonsai Tonight. $1,000,000 for a bonsai? I’ve heard of million dollar bonsai before, but don’t know if I’ve ever seen one (in person or in a photo). We don’t really know what this one sold for, but still, an asking price of 1.3 million dollars is a little … Continue reading Million Dollar Bonsai

Abstract Bonsai & Peace in Our Time

A European bonsai with a Japanese touch. This massive juniper with its wildly sculpted deadwood is reminiscent of bonsai you’d see in Japan in the 80s and 90s. Right down to the quality Japanese pot (unless it’s a Chinese knockoff). The artist is Carlos van der Vaart. Taking the bonsai scene by storm There was a time not very long ago when bonsai with a heavy reliance on sculpted deadwood took the bonsai scene by storm. Rather than attempting to ‘make your bonsai look like a tree’ (John Naka’s famous dictum) these more abstract trees were the result of a … Continue reading Abstract Bonsai & Peace in Our Time

Bunjin Bonsai Bliss

Unfinished, but oh so wild and wonderful. I wonder what this Scot’s pine bunjin beauty looked like before it was collected somewhere in the wilds of Sweden. It belongs to Muaro Stemberger. It’s from his facebook page. Mauro also has a website. It’s called Italian Bonsai Dream. Bunjin or Literati, bonsai elegance by any name The following is from something I wrote for The Magician: The Bonsai Art of Kimura. “Bunjin style bonsai originated in China among scholars and artist who were known as literati, which is another name for bunjin. Originally, literati style bonsai – which dates back to … Continue reading Bunjin Bonsai Bliss

Quiet Dignity

This Cryptomeria japonica is reminisent of the unimaginably vast and towering Giant sequoias in California’s Sierra Nevadas. This effect could be enhanced by photographing it from a little lower (see the photo below), but you still get the drift. Far and few between What a great tree. It’s from Michael Hagedorn’s Crataegus Bonsai. You seldom see a real good formal upright bonsai (you don’t see very many formal uprights at all) and you don’t see many good Cryptomeria bonsai either. Especially in the West; they are more common in Japan (their common name in English is Japanese cedar, even though … Continue reading Quiet Dignity

Out Stealing Bonsai Ideas

Major surgery. From a Bonsai Tonight post entitled ‘Best repotting of the year.’ Rapid evolution There’s a lot going on with bonsai these days, and it’s happening fast and right before our eyes. If you look at the evolution of bonsai, you’ll find slow but steady development up until sometime in the 1980s when the explosion began. Kimura was introducing power tools and Bonsai was becoming international. Suddenly bonsai books and magazines were springing up everywhere, and, at the same time, along comes the internet. Now, new (and old) ideas abound everywhere. Black ponderosa pine? Japanese black pine grafted onto … Continue reading Out Stealing Bonsai Ideas

NEW! Bonsai Embroidered T-Shirts

Brand new. Embroidered bonsai logo on all cotton black T-shirts. Kimura’s legendary formal upright Japanese white pine Long time bonsai embroidery maven Cindy Cones did a remarkable job of replicating Masahiko Kimura’s magnificent formal-upright Japanese white pine bonsai; probably the most distinctive, well-known formal-upright bonsai in the world. So distinctive and well-known that it appears in our Masters’ Series Pine book (2nd printing due in July), in The Magician, The Bonsai Art of Kimura 2 and on the cover of Bonsai Today issue 80. Discounted prices We’ve come up with new pricing formulas that are well below list prices on … Continue reading NEW! Bonsai Embroidered T-Shirts

Pushing the Bonsai Boundaries

Can you imagine the time needed to develop and maintain the numerous foliage clouds? Does this level of refinement exist outside of Japan? Needle juniper (J. rigida) by Shinji Suzuki. From our Masters’ Series Juniper book. Picking up where we left off Our last post provoked more discussion than any post so far. Roughly drawn, the topic is naturalistic bonsai versus highly stylized and highly refined bonsai. I thought it might be good to continue with examples that exist at the extremes, at least in my view. This Big cone Douglas fir by Dan Robinson jumped out at me because … Continue reading Pushing the Bonsai Boundaries