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In love with trees

Carl,
Perfect! This is just the sort of thing folks here (and elsewhere for that matter) that give advice should read and at least try to follow when they are giving advice! I for one have bookmarked this page and will refer back to it.

Thank you for posting this.
Adam

Good stuff! Thanks for sharing!

Newt

The Holy Grail of critiques?

You may have just posted the impossible, man, I sure hope not.

Great thoughts Carl, thanks.

Will

In short a "Critic" should know what he/she is talking about and be without an agenda, or at least have an open mind to an alternitive view point.

Hi Vance,

While both of those things are certainly very nice, it's interesting to note that Auden doesn't require either of them.

Looking at trees with my family, some of whom know nothing about bonsai, their comments often fulfill #2:

Convince me that I have undervalued an author or work because I had not read them carefully enough.

They sometimes see things with closer to the "beginner's mind" that Walter so nicely described in his recent thread.

I personally see no harm in an agenda - so long as the person is not being mindless about it. Many if not most academic literary critics do come in with an agenda: to promote a post-colonialist reading, a feminist reading, a Marxist reading, etc., etc. I don't think this is a problem when the information flow is largely unidirectional, from essayist to reader. Having an agenda often helps put force behind many of goals that Auden listed, I'd argue. Though I admit it can get a bit more frustrating in this new world of interactive discussion.

Best regards,
Carl

A California Live Oak was exhibited at the GSBF Convention 2003 in Fresno, CA.
This was my critique of the oak by Katsumi Kinoshita from Monterey, CA

“This is the ugliest tree of this exhibit! Oh is this ugly! I walk away from it, but stop to look back It is really ugly. Going towards the tree again a bit. How can someone dare to exhibit such a tree in an important show? Everything is wrong on this bonsai. Is it even a bonsai, or just a piece of material in a pot? Look at the reverse taper – terrible. Where is the Nebari? Nonexistent. Where is the fist branch? Oh this is supposed to be the first branch? It is atrocious – sets the theme for the whole tree, yes. This crown looks more like a mushroom than a bonsai. On a scale from one to hundred this tree gets minus fifteen points. Oh is it ugly! Walking away from it and letting the tree speak for a while.
Looking back again and trying to see some detail Going closer, very close. Look at this here in the back of the crown, this is a big old hole. A giant owl must live here. Look at the bark – this is so rugged. How come this most atrocious first branch has such an unusual shape. Where did this tree get the huge scars? This must be a very old tree. The longer I look at it the older it gets. This oak may well be five hundred years old. How about that! This oak was there before the Spaniards came. The guard of the valley saw the native Americans the Spaniards going by; it saw the Russians, the gold diggers; it saw the Republic of California! It has seen it all - much much more than we will ever see. This tree owns the valley. It is so strong that it cold not care less what we think of it. We don’t exist regarding this oak. What does it concern the old oak tree when the sow rubs it’s back at it?
I have deep respect of this tree. I start to admire it. It is so ugly! Ugly in a very serious way, in a respectable way, like a very old person. This tree impresses me deeply.

Is it a bonsai? Is it a good bonsai? Well, if bonsai is a craft and to be judged by the intellect it is a terrible bonsai. If bonsai is an art then we have to ask: is it art when it touches your soul? Yes. Is it high art when it touches your soul very much? Yes. Isn’t art about creating something beautiful? NO! Art is about creating something that touches your soul – can well be ugly.
This tree is so ugly that it has started to be beautiful again. Do we want to improve this oak? No, but maybe we make it a bit more ugly.”

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Thanks for bringing that up, Walter.

Believe it or not, that exact example was one of the things I thought about when I came across these words by Auden. Your critique made me take a second look, showed me a new way to see (or rather, reminded me of one I'd forgotten), and made me fall in love with a very ugly tree.

Best wishes,
Carl

...good warm feeling spreading over my body, turning into a huge grin, thanks Walter.

Will

For example's sake, Andy R. has a huge agenda: to promote the artistic aspect of bonsai and dispel as may false myths (oxymoron?) as he possibly can.
As Carl said, an agenda gives you passion and makes your reading more compelling, even entertaining. I too am very suspicious of people with agendas, but I have to admit that their passion gives them an edge.

I hear a lot of old-timers saying that they don't mind critiques "as long as the person is qualified to give them". Never mind that this qualification in their eyes disqualifies about 99.99 percent of the bonsai crowd, leaving one or possibly two persons on this planet.

I think that there is someting wrong with this statement. I am not advocating that anybody should just step onto a soapbox and start ranting away without knowing or caring what he is talking about. But deciding who is qualified and who is not is a pointless exercise.

What I believe is that anybody can have something genuine and useful to say in terms of critiquing a tree as long as they take time to explain the rationale behind their statements. I think that's a very important requirement, and it is often overlooked. Often we are critiquing without opening ourselves to the listener and showing them the circumstances leading to our opinions.

A critique tells as much about ourselves as about the tree we tackle. So, honesty has major importance if the critique is to be successful.