Attila

Very interesting observation, and a tough one to answer.

I was so intrigued by it that the question in the back of my mind is distracting from my work, so I have to get it off my chest.

First I thought that the lack of any kind of social criticism, using satire, irony, or rebellion in the world of bonsai just shows that bonsai as art is not as sophisticated as the other artforms.

A good excuse would be the limitation of the medium we work with. But I don't really buy that. Human imagination has no boundaries, so if you really wanted, you could express any idea using plants and rocks.

Then it occured to me that there are other art movements expressing a world similar to what bonsai does.

Take romanticism. Romantic landscape painting, romantic music, romantic films. Idealizing the world around us. Romantic art takes us out of the drabness of daily reality into a magical world full of mystery and beauty. It can be just a sophisticated as realism, cubism, etc, as long as it doesn't cross the line into the realm of kitsch. And believe me, many claimed to be romantic artists do cross the line.

So this is the group where I think bonsai belongs to today. The mindset of a bonsai enthusiast is to seek beauty and relaxation. Starting from this premise, irony is just not what we are looking for. The ideals we are seeking to express are not outdated or old fasioned, they are simply eternal. They exist in our minds since we became humans.

Regards,
Attila