Aims in bonsai

AndyWilson

Congrats Glider i do believe that is the longest single post i have ever read

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Mcspeed

Holy Moly, what Glider said.

If you are daring and have some time do a search on art (someone always arts during one of these threads), read around the trash talk and you will see that this is a time old question. In my mind being one that tries to stay out of art conversations, it's simply what you eye sees translated by the brain - perspective and illusion. Someone already said the Naka referance about making you Bonsai look like a tree, and there are how many ways to do that - oh yea just as many as there are trees out there, just some are just not appealing to look at.

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Orbit

That's already been touched on a I admitted it wasn't the best example.

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Kent_E

Longest post I couldn't finish That could be a whole chapter!

Orbit

Firstly, thanks a bunch for your thoughts Glider

I'm not sure I understand exactly what you mean here. You seem to be saying that we should be providing a representation of a tree, which to me sounds fair enough, but wouldn't your bonsai end up looking like a bonsai rather than a tree if bonsai is a representation of a tree? This would somewhat go against what John Naka said if I'm not misinterpreting either of you, which I think I must be in all honesty

Very good point

Just a thought, I could be completely wrong, but could it be that we are failing in our attempts to evoke a viewer's schema for 'tree', in that their exists a schema for bonsai, which is different from that of 'tree'? (if that makes any sense)

As an undergrad biologist I have to disagree with the concept of these things being 'ugly', but I realise that you are not suggesting that they are, but rather that many people would. To me they are beautiful, as is every life form on earth. However, I am aware that most people would more than likely not agree with me. And as many of us want to create a tree that others can appreciate, one must take into consideration these issues.

Agreed.

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AndyWilson

The John Naka point seems like a simple one. Bonsai are a representation of trees in nature (yes even literati). You opened up saying there was a tree in your garden that looks like a bonsai, this is of course an impossiblilty for the simple fact that bonsai represent trees, and not the other way round. They may inspire us to replicate or recreate though. We try to evoke feelings associated with trees we have seen in nature, but we also apply good horticultural practice to keep our trees alive for as long as possible. Yes i have seen the fallen over trees in nature and the ones with crossing branches. I have also seen the heavily diseased and the dead ones too, which are natural, but i aint going to be copying these ones.

By the by, nice topic i have enjoyed reading all of this

Orbit

I am not suggesting that trees represent bonsai in any way. I am suggesting that this tree looks like a representation of a tree rather than an actual tree, if you like. Glider touched on the fact the bonsai are a representation of a tree, rather than a recreation of a tree, this would then mean that a bonsai would look somewhat different to a natural tree, whilst still portraying the essence of treeness (this is a good word ). This being so, if a tree in nature happened to be shaped, coincidently in a similar manner to the basic guidelines of bonsai, the tree could in fact look like a bonsai.

Oh, and cheers, I'm glad you've enjoyed reading the topic

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Glider

Yeah, sorry ‘bout that I’m actually trying to build some display benches, but it won’t stop raining


I think this is one of the problems that language throws up. By definition, all bonsai look like bonsai. However, not all bonsai look like trees.

On the one hand we have the bonsai as an artful representation of a tree in the wild. The rules and techniques have been applied to create the illusion of a venerable tree and its surroundings. On the other hand we have bonsai as an assemblage of the stereotypical features of other bonsai which is a result of falling into the ‘bonsai schema’ trap.

Let me illustrate by way of (hypothetical) thought processes involved in the creation of each:

On the one hand:

I have a tree in training. I look at it and imagine its surroundings. I think this one is growing in pasture in East Anglia (very flat, but rich growing land). There is plenty of rain and the soil is rich. There is a constant (but not severe) prevailing wind because the land is so flat.

So, the tree will appear healthy and lush. The trunk will have a gentle movement that comes from age, but will generally tend to move gently away from the wind. The branches will be slightly longer on the lee side than the windward side. The lower branches will slope down gently under their weight because the tree is so ‘old’, but the longer branches on the lee side will slope slightly more so because they have ‘always’ been heavier.

Another example. I have a tree in training, again I look at it and imagine its surroundings. This one is growing in dry mountain gravel high on a slope. It has poor soil, not much rain and high, grit-laden winds coming up the slope.

So, the tree will be stunted. It won’t have much foliage because it can’t support much. The trunk and branches will be twisted away from the wind but the branches won't slope gently down because the foliage was never heavy enough to pull them down. Over time, the wind and grit will have blasted the bark from the trunk and branches on the windward side. What little foliage it can support is growing in the lee side, gaining some shelter from the shade of its own trunk.

Each of these trees tells a story of the life of the tree. In each case, the story is coherent and makes sense. There is nothing there to jar a viewer awake from the illusion.

On the other hand:

I have a tree in training. I look at it and invoke my schema of a ‘bonsai’. What features do I need to include in order to make this tree look like a ‘bonsai’? Ok, well, it needs a bendy trunk (bonsai have bendy trunks). It also needs the first branch to be the biggest and coming from one side. I’ll add a jin (I know bonsai have jin, I’ve seen them). I have a dremmel, so I’ll make some sharimiki so I can carve the trunk (I’ve seen that in bonsai too). It should have small foliage pads and branches that bend down and so-on.

The end result may possibly be visually pleasing, but the story it tells is incoherent and full of visual non sequiturs. Why does the trunk move like that? What bent it? Why is the shari on the same side as the longer branches? Surely the side subject to the harshest conditions should have the shortest branches? Why are the branches bending so much under the weight of so little foliage? Why does the apex move toward the shari if that’s where the wind is coming from? Why is the jin right above the biggest most healthy branch on the tree and on the opposite side to the shari?

What we have is the ‘stereotype’ of a bonsai; a tree that contains all the stereotypical features of a bonsai but in a combination that makes no sense and raises too many questions to allow a viewer to slide easily into the illusion.

All these examples will ‘look like ‘bonsai’, but some will make sense and others won’t. This is what I think John Naka meant when he said “try to make your bonsai look like a tree, don’t try to make your tree look like a bonsai”. I believe he was arguing for the former approach (above) and I think it’s one of the most profound statements I’ve ever heard in bonsai, because of its implications for bonsai design.

No bonsai exists in isolation as ‘just’ a tree. Each tree carries with it the story of its life and thus, the suggestion of its surroundings and environment. If the story it tells makes no sense, the illusion is shattered to the detriment of the tree itself.

The upshot is that we need to understand the forces that create the most rewarding characteristics of trees in the wild, in order to be able to combine the representations of these characteristics in a way that makes sense, i.e. tell a coherent story.

For example, why don’t we create shari on deciduous trees like maple? Well, because deciduous trees rarely grow in situations where the necessary forces for natural shari exist (high, drought ridden rocky slopes with strong, grit laden winds). We never see such examples in nature. The ‘story’ told by the shari would be incongruous with the nature of the tree. The only time we see shari on deciduous trees is in the presence of disease and as Andy says, nobody want to copy those. They are not rewarding to look at.

Yes it does make a lot of sense.

A lot of it comes down to the individual and amount of exposure an individual has had to trees in the wild (I mean actually noticing and paying attention to them) and also to bonsai. In some cases, people (particularly city dwellers) will have little exposure to real trees, and when they go out to the country, will not really notice trees in the wild, beyond the ‘oh, there are some trees’ experience. Many people I know can’t tell what species a tree is, or even one tree from another. They’re all just ‘trees’ (big, brown and green lollipop shaped things growing in the ground). In such cases, the schema for 'tree' will be very narrow and fixed (you can actually see it if you get such a person to draw a tree).

Likewise, in some cases, the only exposure to bonsai will have been to stereotypical examples (cf ‘Karate Kid’), in which case, they will have a relatively narrow and ‘fixed’ schema for ‘bonsai’ that is likely to be incongruous with their equally narrow and fixed schema for ‘tree’.

In such cases it’s highly likely that many excellent bonsai will not match their schema of ‘real trees’. However, it’s also likely that many excellent bonsai won’t match their schema for ‘real bonsai’ either.

But as I say, that’s down to exposure (learning). I don’t think it’s catastrophic if our bonsai does not evoke in a viewer the schema of a tree if that other has little experience of trees and no experience of bonsai. It’s enough if they consider them nice to look at. We can only expect a bonsai to evoke a tree schema in a person if that person has comparatively broad range of tree schemata to begin with and that only comes from exposure (conscous experience of different types and shapes of tree).

Even expensive wine tastes awful to me; like vinegar that hasn’t quite made it. It’s not the fault of the vintner. It’s down to my lack of exposure to wine (preferring, as I do, to suck down lots of tequila). My lack of appreciation says absolutely nothing about the quality of the wine or the vintner. However, if I was a vintner and wine tasted awful to me, I would have a real problem. The primary viewers of our bonsai are ourselves. If a bonsai (and the story it suggests) makes sense to us, it’s likely to do so to others with similar experience and exposure. The more we learn, the more likely this becomes.

I think anybody who has looked at real trees and paid attention to them and the differences between them will have a tree schema evoked by viewing a bonsai.

That’s very true, but as a professional Psychological Scientist I would like to make the differentiation between the global and more poetic concept of beauty as an inherent feature of life itself, and the less global concept of beauty as ‘visually appealing’ and ‘attractive’ (in the Psychobiological sense, i.e. that engages a positive affective state and its concomitant behavioural ‘approach’ motivation).

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lehket

Gilder,

Well, you certainly went well beyond my small observation. It clearly took awhile to assemble all that. Thank you for making the effort. The results are illuminating in several ways.

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