by Arthur Skolnik

In my search for interesting articles, I found this article on the Toronto Bonsai Societies web site (www.torontobonsai.org) and am reprinting it with their permission. The information contained in this article is something to think about when visiting others bonsai collection, or looking at your collection after a workshop - ED

The Toronto Bonsai Society, like many clubs in large cities, is very active. At least several times a year our monthly meetings include a workshop. A less experienced member is teamed up with a more advanced member and together they discuss and style a domestic or imported tree. The rest of the club mills about, going from work station to work station, watching the progress. We've been following this format for many years and at this point there are a lot of trees out there which have had some initial design input but no follow up. I think a constructive critique workshop would be a good idea.

A group of more experienced members would analyze and then suggest possible design improvements. Other factors could be discussed. The health of the tree and how the owner might improve it; techniques for implementing design suggestions, etc. This could be beneficial not only to the owners of the critique trees, but to others, including the group of "experienced" members. Photos could be taken and the trees could be included in the following year's program for a progress report. Has the owner used suggestions and has the tree improved as a result?

After all, doesn't the challenge of Bonsai lie in the fact that trees should be continuously improving? Even though someone may have every Bonsai book and video on the market today, if they lived on an island, isolated from any outside design input, I don't believe their trees would be as advanced as they could be without a little, concrete, constructive criticism.

I remember sitting in my Bonsai teacher's workshop in rural Japan late one afternoon. We spent most of the day in one of his growing fields not too far from his home, root pruning and transplanting white pines which had been in the ground for 25 years or so. This operation is performed with the frequency of youngish trees in pots - every two to four years. After pruning we replanted them in a more fertile part of the field. We used a sharp shovel, root hook and plastic-handled spring loaded pruners. Every day in Japan I saw, felt and tasted many wondrous things. But this job was disappointing. Not one of the trees we worked on in the field had any merit for anything even remotely resembling Bonsai, or so it seemed. I asked him why he would want to waste time and space on these worthless trees. It wasn't very long until I ate my words and got my daily fill of awe, Japanese style. All he said was, "You will see at home."

In the yard outside his workshop at home he looked at a white pine that had been dug up and potted the year before. I could tell that the tree came from the same field and potential for Bonsai. It had three branches, all on the right side, and all near the top. It was awful, challenging to say the least. He picked up the tree and motioned me to my seat in the workroom. He wired the three branches, the secondary branches, twigs and buds on the useless tree in no time. Then he bent the top branch back and around to the left of the trunk, spreading out foliage so its new volume filled more air than before. Next, he took the middle branch and raised it in such a way as to disguise the poorly tapered trunk. Again he splayed out the branches, secondary branches, twigs and buds, this time creating a beautifully domed apex. I was amazed, speechless. I saw it but couldn't believe it. What was obvious to him was obviously outside the reach of my imagination. He then bent the last branch forward, down a little and then back. It was as if he had inserted the last piece of a jig saw puzzle. It fit perfectly, as though it was meant to be, because it was always there but needed someone to "put it together." He adjusted the wired branches so they flowed the same as the others and the trunk and was done. I had just witnessed a truly wondrous thing: the spontaneous, miraculous, instantaneous metamorphosis of a humble chrysalis to the creation of an elegant, refined and powerful heirloom. O.K., O.K. It wasn't that great, but you should have been there. What he did to that tree was magical.

A really beautiful tree is made up of many skillfully designed and thought out aspects and elements. You may not have the ability, skill or experience to see or do what is required to judge a tree or take it to the next higher level. Stay open and humble. If someone tells you what they think about a tree and you don't agree, that's fine. If someone offers suggestions which you agree with but do not feel you have the skill or guts to actually do the necessary improvement, that's fine too. There are no Bonsai Police to do follow-up investigations. If you feel you would like to offer suggestions which may improve another's tree, first ask if he or she would mind discussing it, and ask for permission to touch the tree to enhance your explanation. Be gentle and tactful say things like "If this were my tree I would..." or "I like this but how about that..."

Whenever I attend a Bonsai convention or symposium, I try to attend at least one critique. I think they are the very best way of learning how to improve the design of a tree. I always enjoy watching and learning how the person leading the critique analyzes the trees in a display, often opening my eyes to details or aspects I didn't or couldn't see.

Try this. When looking at Bonsai (pictures, too) make a mental note, actually saying to yourself "which aspects of the tree do I appreciate or like and which do I not like?" In doing this mental exercise over and over with hundreds of trees, you may discover that at a subconscious level you are designing trees with some of those aspects of design you like.

Every tree has its own maximum or best design potential. Sometimes two or three possibilities may be acceptable as the path to a tree's best design potential. The point is that path may lie just out of reach of your experience or imagination. If you ask for a Constructive Critique, who knows, your eyes may open to new possibilities.

SO I LEARNED SEVERAL THINGS.

• Poor trees may become great ones;
• Don't criticize unless you understand the limits and possibilities of a tree;
• Be open to the fact that someone else may see something you don't see;
• That person may be a neophyte, who in the quest to better comprehend the complexities inherent in conceptualizing four dimensional art (the fourth dimension being life itself) by probing design, may stumble upon an improvement you missed;
• Familiarity blurs vision;
• Some trees, whether good or bad, may not be improvable;
• The solution to a problem tree may come from one person or a composite of ideas from several persons.