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What we don't know about all of this easily rivals or surpasses what we do. It's a matter of perspective. (And we are aware that some of these questions do not precisely delineate a topic. Their subjective readings/interpretations by you add dimensions to the inquiry.) If you have any answers or corrections or additional questions, please contact rjb@phoenixbonsai.com . All who are and will be interested in this international gardening art thank you.
(Special thanks to John Ruger from Brookhaven, PA, for a couple of insightful
comments in the earliest days of this page, especially regarding the "Clip
& Grow" technique and also Chinese painting influences.)
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HORTICULTURE What horticultural knowledge was specifically gained from working with dwarf potted trees, as opposed to learnings from nursery or landscape plants? How has/is bonsai affecting gardening in general? Training of landscape plants for a "Japanese" look, increasing the number of plants tried, increasing some gardeners' abilities/confidence with some plants/techniques; better understanding of the growth patterns, disease and healing processes, effects of human intervention in shaping/caring for? Are there significant decreases in the production of growth hormones and other substances, such as gibberellin, in long-time bonsai? If such a specimen was then planted in the ground, how long would it take before the levels of those substances normalized? COLLECTORS Was there ever a tree that so resisted being dug that several collectors died trying to retrieve it? What is the highest percentage of wild-dug plants from a given region that survived? That didn't and thus were extremely valuable? On a larger scale, did/are certain trees and other plants (and stones) wanting to have a lifetime that includes confinement in a relatively shallow container, dependent upon one or more humans for supply of nutrients in exchange for the energies of admiration which aesthetic fine-shaping ("fine tuning") and display would attract, and the possibility of a more sheltered/longer uninjured life? Did/are certain humans wanting to have experience that includes confining trees and other plants and stones in relatively shallow containers and learning how to supply these with nutrients and appreciation in exchange for energies of sharing the "lifetimes" of these containerized beings, learnings about your creative and nurturing abilities, any energies of admiration directed towards them whether for efforts or ommissions by you, previous caretakers, or natural occurrence? (Similarly, while some yamadori decided that they did not want to be transplanted and containerized, a minority chose to partake of this unique life and thus survived collection and transplantation.) Who was/is the greatest yamadori (wild-grown specimen) collector of all times? Did a collector ever commit suicide (or perhaps was forced to do so) because a particularly valued tree which he collected did not survive transplantation? Through the centuries, how many collectors died attempting to acquire trees and/or rocks? Professional collectors? Amateurs trying to get a prized tree or a little extra income? How many were seriously injured/handicapped similarly? Any killed or injured by rival collectors or by guards employed to protect a significant find until it could be otherwise safely collected? In addition to regular watering and tending, how were collectors' potted trees cared for compared to other items such as artwork, viewing stones, etc? TEACHERS/STUDENTS Did any student of the art ever deform/mutilate himself to try to better understand a dwarf potted tree's essence? How many artists or other affectionados have had bonsai or penjing or suiseki tatoos or calligraphy emblazoned on their skins? What kind of trees did those early teachers demonstrate with -- if at all? Did any of them make drawings of what their trees would someday look like after whatever training they would do, as our teachers sketch nowadays? Can we suppose that at those closed gatherings, even the earliest ones, educators and teachers and collectors shared orally their successes and failures, discoveries and questions? Did they puzzle over which plants flowered in the wild but not in the container, what fertilizer (completely organic at the time) and water combinations produced abundant growth or compact foliage? When were such bodies of knowledge first written down and circulated -- how much knowledge was initially kept secret, passed only between father and son, teacher and student, not for public or competitor's discovery? Did adherance to a school's styles prevent participation in a larger realm? Was a student coming in from another province -- if he was accepted at all by a new teacher -- prohibited from designing trees in his native styles? How did one become a student or receive recognition as a master? Were "independents" -- non-specific school associated artists -- held in less esteem? Did some take on a false identity/credentials so as to not be so identified? What is the oldest continuous teacher-student lineage still in existence? Ever? Teachers who retired voluntarily or by misfortune -- what careers were they in afterwards? Who was the oldest lived and practicing master? Who was the youngest prodigy? Did the latter maintain his (her?) brilliance in the arts or did he peak early and dim? What teacher created with or without assistance the most non-starter dwarf potted trees during his (or her?) lifetime? Has there ever been mention of any form of internal exercises or chants/prayers/meditations which were done by the ancient masters of penjing while digging up, potting or shaping trees? What internal techniques, if any, might the masters have employed which never were passed on with the external ones when the art was taught outside of one's inner circle of students? If the "magical miniature landscapes" were a part of Daoism and Buddhism, didn't the esoteric understanding of these objects cross with Buddhism over to Japan? There were several distinct visits to China by Japanese monks, who then returned to further Buddhism in Japan. When some of them brought back the miniature landscapes as presents, didn't they bring back the "magic" also? Were the teachings so subtle that the Japanese who brought them back could not pass on the teachings for very long? Or were the teachings brought over, but these flourished in secret, even to this day, never being revealed to the ignorant masses or foreigners? To some extent, perhaps secrecy and "snobbishness" was reasonable based on the extensive classical training the aristocracy underwent compared to the ignorance and impatience of the non-aristocrats or foreign Westerners. Were the shapes of some ancient trees in the wild ever "reverse constructed" by artisans who tried different pruning techniques on nursery-stock to see what "injuries" caused what growth patterns? Was this a standard training technique for students of this gardening art? Perhaps a "final" study project was the recreation in 3-D miniature of a tree seen in some famous scroll or perhaps one which the teacher knew existed hidden in the wilds. CLUBS When and where was what could be considered the first formal bonsai club -- in Japan or China? What were the earlier meetings/gatherings like -- what degree of organization and business planning; what teaching schedule, membership requirements, accessibility of plant material and supplies? Were there many do-it-yourself pot throwings or digs -- or were these always the work of specialists? What about seed collection or propagation of cuttings? Were outings ever organized to go into the forests and hills to gather plant material for penjing as well as for one's garden in general? Or was collecting the sole privilege of professionals? What was the earliest association of enthusiasts? What is the most specialized club/association? (A native Japanese visitor to the Phoenix Bonsai Society in the early 1990s mentioned a club whose members only had trees with good rootage showing.) Do club experiences combine to form gestalts of creativity, of definition, of design? Can a large-enough club affect the course of regional styles with more combined experience than dozens of individual and scattered masters centuries ago? PROPAGATION When and where did the first nurseries start including some dwarf potted trees? When and where were the first ones exclusively devoted to dwarf potted trees established? Was the owner wealthy enough to support the nursery's operations, as opposed to the sale of the trees making even a small profit? And how long did these operations last? What is the most unusual type of plant ever made into a dwarf potted tree? What species/variety is/was the most common? What is the most common multi-species graft, black & white pines? Most unusual ("fruit cocktail tree?")? What about a multi-species raft? What is the largest number of species of woody plants in a single penjing or saikei or forest planting which survived more than just a few years? Could the top growth of a tree be re-grafted (given a new rootstock) for improved vigor? Is there an upper limit on the number of times this could be done or the oldest the scion could be? What was the first use of the thread graft technique to add a branch to a trunk? Was a random branch once caught in a crack of a trunk and a reasonably attractive branch resulted growing in a desired direction? What is the largest number of dwarf potted trees layered from a single landscape specimen? Or propagated by cuttings therefrom? How much truth is there in Richard Gordon Smith 's statement that the great pine of Karasaki was the "'father' of all Japan's dwarf mushroom-shaped trees"? Are there any dwarf specimens still extant which claim origin from the massive tree? Could DNA comparison with seedlings from the now dead great pine prove this? When was the first phoenix graft-equivalent purposely made, using a living tree attached in some fashion to a piece of driftwood/dead wood? What was the designer's inspiration? Might it have been to create the illusion of a previous potted tree still being alive? LITERATURE Have any books been banned/burned/heavily edited because they contained cultivation/design "secrets?" How much more did some of the authors know about bonsai/penjing than what they wrote? Who had ghostwriters who knew more about bonsai or were more eloquent than the designated author? What did the various editors cut out, change or remove -- and why (changes in political or philosophical thought, passings of masters, family secrets, personal differences with the author, etc)? Nüshu is/was a script specifically used by and taught among Chinese women of old. Was there ever a penjing equivalent? What specialist writings did Chu Shun-shui bring with him from China to Japan in 1659, and what specific teachings on the art did he impart? Is there any evidence from older times of how the designers of magical miniature landscapes thought and talked about their creations or the tools and other materials used therefor? If we did have written evidence, what particular changes in meanings and subtle shadings of terms may have been used back then that are not known to us currently? New 11/01/08 When will we see translations in a European-based language of the records from the various "Garden of Dragon Flowers" shops southwest of Shanghai which have been engaged in cultivating miniature trees in containers since the sixteenth century and perhaps even earlier? (Hrdlickovi, V.aZ. "The Garden of the Dragon Flowers," Bonsai, BCI, Vol. XXVIII, No. 3, May/June 1989, pp. 20-21. Translated by Vladamir Mandl. Reprinted from Vol. VII, No. 1, 1987 of the publication of the Bonsai Club of Praha (Prague, Czechoslovakia)) The garden masters' names are said to have been preserved in the same way as their work in that location -- who were they, what was their training, what was their legacy? When will we have annotated translations with illustrations -- with author biographies, commentary and historical references, later citations, bibliography, idiomatic explanations, etc. -- of the older Chinese works on penjing in one or more European-based languages? What other Asian works on the subject do we not have listed? How many first published illustrations does Kyosuke Gun have? Which ones are the most reprinted? Are there any documented losses of collections or individual compositions or teachers to flooding, earthquake, typhoon, or wars? What are the different forms of records and documentation which exist for various old and revered trees? What happens to the records for trees which die of old age or injury? Are sketches included in any of the records, besides maybe a listing of when assorted designers cared for the plant, when it perhaps was restyled or significantly repotted, propagations from the parent plant, viewings by notable personages, etc? How many total copies of the 518 consecutive issues of Norio Kobayashi's Bonsai magazine were printed? (Journal, ABS, Vol. 2, No. 1, pg. 17) What is the oldest issue still extant? What kind of influence did that periodical really have on the Japanese style of the art? Who were some of the teachers to have articles, photographs, illustrations or their trees displayed in the pages? MING TREES/ARTIFICIAL REPRESENTATIONS Was there ever a Ming tree constructed with stones used as leaves which were specifically chosen due to their natural edges which added to the resemblance of a tree? What was the most intrinsically valuable Ming tree ever constructed? Were any Ming trees built around the trunk or branches of a deceased bonsai, effectively immortalizing the original plant? SUISEKI/VIEWING STONES Were viewing stones ever treated similarly to the large garden stones submerged in Tai Hu by one generation and then retrieved two generations later appropriately "aged"? In August 1969, the long-lost suiseki of Shinran Shonin, "Hongwan Reiseki" was discovered in a warehouse of the Fukuzo Temple. The stone had been lost for centuries. During 1580, with the "War of Ishiyama" raging through the area, the stone was transferred to the Fukozu Temple of the Koyasan near Kyoto for safekeeping by Kennyo Shinran, the eleventh generation successor to Shinran. The stone then disappeared after that. The authenticity of the stone was confirmed through writings found in the box with the stone, dated equivalent to April 13, 1585 (per unattributed "History of Suiseki" in Bonsai, BCI, June 1970, pg. 11) . Was the suiseki simply forgotten about, buried under other objects, smuggled elsewhere? What other famous stones have been rediscovered -- or have yet to be? Are there any fossil equivalents of Chrysanthemum stones with leaves and other discernable features? Was there ever a portable stone which naturally resembled a large stone in the same owner’s garden? PERSONAL LEARNING What are the social, cultural and political ramifications of personal involvement with dwarf potted trees? How did one's hands-on experience (seeing, studying, caring for, designing, collecting, teaching, crafting, etc.) impact one's family, self, work, and civic life? Were any lessons/concepts/terminology transferred to "outside"? And what lessons, etc. from "outside" were transferred to dwarf potted tree culture? How are our psyches altered by our relationship with the dwarf potted trees? Our perceptions and concepts of growth over a period of time; aggressive or submissive lines of movement; seeming limits on our manual dexterity and imagination; biological similarity and partnership; how a living partnership differs from a nonliving one; self-image reflected in one's creative endeavors, both in what one alters and what one allows to remain and change as is; external reflection of our developing levels of skill; one's influence over spatial display vs. temporal display by allowing the growth/fill in/branch development later; continual cycles of nature and life fulfillment through the nourishing of a living thing which in turn provides a form of nourishment for our spirits; memories of other trees observed, worked on or dreamed of; the kinds of trees preferred or ignored. Also, branches clipped or not clipped and secondary growth which occurred or never did; buds left or removed; soil mixes used or not used; special fertilizer components given or not given; watering given or not given (quantity and timing); climate protection given or not given; pests and disease removed early or ignored; sides chosen or not chosen to be the front; pots matched with the tree or not used; grafts made or not made; garden/growing bed/larger pot kept in for one more season or not; teachings of our teachers or other rules applied or not; formal display or not; words of praise or criticism by family members, friends or visitors; the experiences of our trees' siblings, clones or scions. How ignorant would we be if every one of our trees and cuttings, etc. lived? All the space and pots that would not be available to us for new material on our display shelves; all the new material which we wouldn't try to find hardier or more appealing to us. The limited amounts of pruning and wiring we could do on only our earliest chosen specimens. Our experience from failure would be virtually nonexistent -- and that of our teachers as well. What developments of the art could be traced to failure? What part of our involvements is for the social interaction at the club setting, the tactile manipulation, the visual training, or the creative removal of everything that is not this particular ideal bonsai? What elements do we need to absorb by this activity -- chlorophyll stains on and needle pricks into our fingers; aromas absorbed from juniper and pine; wood dust inhaled; the sound of different plant branches being clipped by concave cutters and of water soaking into the soil mix and dripping out the bottom of the pot; the clay of unfired pots, and so forth? What is our love, purposes, belief, and intent with each of our creations? Why do we create these magical miniature landscapes? Where do we end and our bonsai start? How much of our landscapes are us and how much are the previous caretakers and designers? What facets of our trees did we not intend? What characteristics did we not consciously emphasize in our landscapes, did not highlight, did not remove? Can we seek to take lessons from no-longer-waking-alive teachers in our dreams? Can we get "second chances" in our dreams with trees and landscapes of ours that are no longer physically present because they have either gotten new owners or are no longer living? What can we learn in our dreams about plant material, styling techniques, compositional symbolism, and so forth from artists who lived in other cultures or at other times? Studying the past, we can learn of techniques and interpretations not currently in use in our culture. These "old" methods might occasionally be useful for us now. Are the ghosts of past trees or teachers around us working to see how we've learned from them? Look at each of your bonsai and imagine each going through the seasons -- speeding up the time, beginning a few years past. How big was each plant then? what branches did it have that are now gone, which branches had yet to grow? how did the tree's position and style change? Do this for at least a decade worth of years -- what did you learn? Try this on each tree some other time, but alter the shaping -- how will these two futures vary for this same tree? BTW, while doing this, how did your display area change "over the years"? which shows were the trees in, what repotting happened? Any random weather disturbances or diseases affecting the trees? JAPAN Did Tokugawa Iemitsu ever receive bonsai as a present during any of the daimyō 's visits to Edo? What was the pay scale and types of "percs" for Iemitsu's gardener compared with the average gardener or average person? What about Kyuzo Murata for his care of the Imperial Collection? Per Shinobu Nozaki, Dwarf Trees, 1940, pg. 24: "The Emperor Meiji, who was a fine poet besides being a great ruler, loved bonsai culture and encouraged it as a national art." What part did the Meiji Emperor actually play in the popularization of bonsai? Did any of the early 20th century bonsai teachers participate in or comment upon the Hachi-niwa displays at the turn of the century? Did these exhibits or competitions have any influence upon subsequent bonsai events or display? Display rules were formalized and adopted by the 1930s. When were the earliest version of these put into use? What was the last modification to these rules prior to their widespread acceptance? Did Shinobu Nozaki give any lectures or classes on bonsai? In his 1940 book he lists thirty growers -- all in Tokyo? -- of the fifty pictured trees. These included a Miss Etsu Goto. Other than Norio Kobayashi, none of these names has been seen in post-war references. Have they been overlooked or were these nearly three dozen enthusiasts either killed during the war, disheartened after the war, or simply thereafter anonymous to the records? How many bonsai were on Imperial Japanese ships during WWII as momentos of home? Are there any documented trees which successfully were in the Navy and are still extant? Were any Chinese dwarf potted trees similarly carried by Chinese troops? Did any of the bonsai which survived the blasts and firestorms following the atomic bombs on Hiroshima (Aug. 6) or Nagasaki undergo any type of growth spurt along the lines of plants mentioned on pp. 95-96 of John Hershey's 1946 book, Hiroshima? Did any bonsai there leave a "radiation shadow" burned into a nearby wall or bench? When was the Imperial Palace garden in Tokyo first established and by whom? What was the bonsai area's initial size and its current size; when was the first tree displayed there and how many are there now; what are the pedigrees and family histories of the various caretakers? A tree inventory taken at its prime would show what as the most common, least common, oldest, youngest specimens? Which ones are/were gifts from elsewheres or donated by a master's family? What became of former parts of the collection? Are there any photos or paintings of these gifts? Other large/great collections: what is the same data as above? What are the oldest compositions in each of the Omiya nurseries? What are the most common trees and least common ones? Are there any Chinese trees long ago brought over to Japan still living bonsai? What about cuttings or first-generation seedlings from these mainland specimens? What taxes or tariffs have been applied specifically to dwarf potted trees? (See Rein, for example.) How and where were Japanese techniques ever brought over to China or Korea and employed with or without modification? CHINA Were other Chinese Buddhist schools involved in penjing design besides the Chan? Did any of these have some specific influence on the Japanese concepts of miniature landscapes? Was the creation of dwarf potted trees ever considered to be an art form by any of the Chinese authorities to the same extent and with the same restrictions as painting or sculpture? What and where was the earliest that it was officially recognized or acknowledged as an artform? Was knowledge of penjing creation or writing about their appreciation ever remotely a requisite for successful completion of a civil service examination? The "Clip and Grow" technique was developed by monks at a Guandong temple in the late 1800s. What was that location's previous experience with penjing, what styles were concurrent with "C&G," where did they get the idea for, were there other styles attempted but discarded in favor of "C&G," what did the first "C&G" trees look like and what material were they? Were there ever any versions of "Clip and Grow" used prior to the temple's technique? Trees in some Southern School paintings seem as if shaped by "C&G." Couldn't there have been an earlier version which perhaps fell out of favor? Were the shapes of any dwarf potted trees immortalized in scrolls (by gardener artists or artist neighbors) by being depicted as wild or mountain-grown trees? With respect to the time period in which "C&G" seemed to originate, it would almost seem to have been a final "tribute" to what was essentially the end of dynastic rule in China, the formation of a "republic" and the overwhelming effects of foreign influences and intervention. Could "C&G" be interpreted, in part, as an attempt to leave for posterity a continuing appreciation for a specific artistic style (as demonstrated in landscape paintings) and belief system, and therefore a hopeful continuation of the ancient principles of Daoism? Or maybe it was simply easier to train dwarf potted trees in this style with the material they had available... What parallel developments died out, what cousins or offshoots were practiced for a while but are no longer? In China, potted plants have been trained in the shape of auspicious characters -- "living lucky words," as it were -- and also in what the West would describe as topiary forms: were these ever considered in the same general category as penjing by Chinese teachers? Were there any formal or distinct guidelines or boundaries for penjing vs. other potted creative plants? During the Boxer Rebellion (1900-1901), trees in the streets of Peking -- and other locations throughout China -- were stripped of bark and leaves for food and then for firewood. How many and what kind of dwarf potted trees suffered the fate of being turned into fuel? Per Deborah Koreshoff, Bonsai; Its Art, Science, History and Philosophy, pg. 6, the Japanese gifted bonsai to the Shanghai Botanical Garden in 1928. Who initiated the gift, how many trees were involved and from whom, how many persons saw the trees on display in China, how many trees have survived, what became of the other trees and/or containers, what newspaper or other documentation exists of the gift? Why were some of the penjing spared on the mainland during the Chinese Cultural Revolution? Was it because they were deliberately hidden, in [politically] out-of-the-way locations or in public museums and gardens, as opposed to private collections? Were some actually moved ahead of the advancing Red Guard? |
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ELSEWHERES What was the longest that any of the earliest souvenir dwarf potted trees sent back to Europe (in the 17th or 18th centuries) survived? Was a container, left over after its tree died, ever reused while briefly trying to duplicate the art with native stock? Or did it become a fancy flower or herb pot, perhaps ending up catalogued in some museum or private collection as an obscure piece of Oriental porcelain? The Chinese Hong merchant Puankequa II in Canton sent Joseph Banks rare plants, including a very old dwarf tree...[which] was eventually presented to the Queen before 1810. "Several specimens of dwarf trees" were sent to England for Queen Victoria from China as early as 1847. Trees from Japan were known to be in the South Kensington Museum by at least 1864. How long did any of these live and what became of their containers? Any documentation about these trees? Did any early enthusiast mention having read Macartney, Livingstone, Main, Davis, or Fortune? What ever happened to Hugo Mulertt's collection or the trees from the Acton nursery under the care of Segiro Takagi? What percentage of dwarf potted trees shipped to U.S. or Europe in the late 19th/early 20th centuries survived just the journey? Which kind of trees faired best? worst? What happened to the containers of the nonsurvivors? When and by whom were the first bonsai smuggled into Hawaii? How were they hidden or camouflaged from authorities' eyes? Were there any bonsai on exhibit, however briefly, at any of the great New York beach amusement parks in the early 1900s? Some of the exotic exposition displays found their way to these -- were there ever any little trees, however briefly, at Coney Island, Luna Park, Steeplechase Park, etc? A photo is said to exist of General Douglas MacArthur's visit to young Saburo Kato's garden after the war. The occasion was probably recorded by both USA and Japanese bureaucrats. Kato recalled the occasion: "My heart pounded with fear when I heard that MacArthur was to visit my garden. I knew only of traditional Japanese culture and it gave no worth to a defeated enemy." ( Per e-mails to RJB from Lindsay Farr, March 18-19, 2003, who says he was told the story by David Fukumoto a decade or so earlier. ) Is there any independent documentation of this story which seems to have historical legitimacy due to MacArthur's known interest in having his officers (and their families) learn the traditional arts and culture of Japan? OTHERWISE NOT YET CLASSIFIED What is the oldest known pot and/or tree and/or landscape from each province? What is the earliest known graphic portrayal of an extant old pot, tree or landscape? What are the names of the actual historical styles of the trees shown in the various paintings? What is the longest a single human has cared for a particular dwarf potted tree? A single family through the generations? What is the oldest plant continuously grown in a container or an extant cutting therefrom which continues the lineage? Ever? What is the shortest-lived bonsai? Can an annual plant be trained sufficiently to be considered as "bonsai"? What masterpiece dwarf potted trees are in private collections and have never been publicly exhibited? What was/is the most photographed tree? Suiseki? What was the most depicted pre-photography dwarf potted tree? Miniature landscape? What is the largest composition made up of only variegated plants, or otherwise genetic mutants? What composition has the greatest purposely-included number of component species -- plant, fungal, microbiotic? What is the tiniest old dwarf potted tree ever designed? How long did it live? (RJB recalls seeing a photograph in a Sunday issue of The Arizona Republic from the early 1970s of a dentist who grew seedlings in extracted human molars.) What other "micropots" have been used? Was there ever a matched set of a few viewing stones or dwarf potted trees assembled – different sizes but with very similar shape? If a group of knowledgeable persons were to describe independently a given composition in detail, how varied could their subjective experiences of this miniature landscape be? What do our trees or stones or pots look like under different EM wavelengths ( infrared, ultraviolet, X-Ray, T-ray, etc.; ultrasound)? What percentage of each of the social/economic classes cared for dwarf potted trees in the various regions and times? What is the longest a village has been able to survive economically due to dwarf potted tree related activities (pots, trees, tools, designers, teachers, etc.)? Was there ever a temple furnished because of funds from the trees or stones which the members sold? Was any dwarf potted tree at least marginally pivotal in any historical/political event? Do the histories of any extant trees -- or pots -- include a note that they were taken as war booty? Or when war threatened, were trees and other art treasures taken to safe havens such as temples or out into the country? Were valuables or messages ever smuggled in the rootball or deadwood or hollowed trunk of a dwarf potted tree? What methods have been employed to safeguard pots, stones or trees? What was the highest price ever paid – financially, in trade, in human life, in political alliance -- for a single pot or tree or landscape? What was the most unusual thing traded for a miniature landscape -- goods, land, livestock, persons, title, etc.? Was ever a sale of a dwarfed potted tree faked using a green branch cut and stuck in a pot rootless? New 11/01/08 What was the market and marketing of new or old trees -- first offered or being let go by an estate, for instance? New 11/01/08 Were any documented trees or stones given as wedding presents or on the birth of a child? Or would an ancient dwarfed tree be bad feng shui? Were any trees or stones ever kept near a sick or dying person so as to: allow him to share in the ancient energies, give the evil spirits within him a place to go, or give his spirit a place to call upon death? New 11/01/08 Were any magical miniature landscapes constructed for sympathetic magic purposes? Perhaps to insure forest plenty? As a channel to forest or mountain spirits? New 11/01/08 What is the largest single tree or multiple plant composition – height or width or depth – to have ever been constructed? When, where, by whom, why, what happened to this composition? Were any herbal plants trained as miniatures and kept so that when they were regularly pruned for shape the cuttings therefrom would be specifically used for medicinal purposes? (See also Richard W. Bender's Herbal Bonsai.) Were early penjing/stones talismans which were kept to repel demons/evil spirits? Could the presence of certain medical plants dwarfed or concentrated have been thought sufficient to return health? What about even "just" a placebo effect from them being near? Are there any individual quality trees which started as components of a saikei or penjing? Have there been any significant geographically-restricted collections (types of native trees found only in a small area) or taxonomically closely-related collections of trees (only in a single family or genus, perhaps)? What other members of families unofficially took care of prize trees? Did some unrecorded but talented wife shape the trees which her husband was credited with? Bonsai are said to be idealized representatives of trees growing under the influences of the various elements of climate and location. They are "ideal" to certain humans, but are they "ideal" to nature? Can they indeed stimulate the memory and soul to remember and visualize all the trees one has ever witnessed? Would all humans, if so inclined, say the relatively sparse and clean branched dwarf potted trees are truly representative of nature? Driving along the highway, for instance, we notice that the vast majority of full-grown trees have non-ideal characteristics including branch shape and outline. Are these not also represented by our bonsai -- or are our small charges "sanitized" and "prettied-up," "plastic-surgeried beauty queens" even with occasional shari and jin? What small percentage of actual growing-in-the-wild trees come close to the proportions of what we call good or great bonsai? Would a bonsai with crossed branches or less definition also serve to stimulate our memories? If we cannot go back to the Isles of the Blessed Immortals -- the supposed original reference of magical miniature landscapes -- with our trees and stones today, where can we go? Where are we going? What will the meanings and purposes of these dwarf potted trees be a hundred or two years from now, or a thousand or two? Were there the equivalent of magical miniature landscapes in ancient legendary civilizations as Atlantis? Will these landscapes continue to be created and cared for bu humans into the next Ice Age? Will magical miniature landscapes be used in the future off-earth as reminders of our first Nature? What are the unexplored potentials of magical miniature landscapes? What do we not yet realize about the undeveloped nature of dwarf potted trees and other portable landscapes? Height, width, depth, weight, style, species, composition, school/tradition, season, health, container, chronological age, apparent age, aesthetic movement, negative space, intrinsic value, commercial value, other aesthetics, social/cultural symbolism, private symbolism, history, soil mix, accessory plants, watering, fertilizer, symbiotic properties, etc.? What we don't know includes frames of reference not usually applied. What other ways of directing branches and bud growth have not been tried or imagined? All of this points to the true nature of bonsai -- a cooperative art/dance between people and plants with rocks being additional elements of our joint compositions. What types of investigation and analysis will be done in this art in the next 10, 50, 100 years? What answers will today's novices give to tomorrow's when the former have more experience, thought and demonstrated creativity? How will these answers differ from the answers given today? Do our trees dance in the winds and rains and snows? or in the movement of the sun, moon and stars? New 11/01/08 Do our trees taste various kinds of fertilizer in their water, or irregular waterings/temporary droughts, new soil mixes, or lime-sulfur fumes off of treated deadwood? Can they taste/smell/hear news carried by the winds through their branches or leaves? Do the chloroplasts see in various wavelengths and know when heavy clouds are above? Or when they are under fluorescent lights indoors at shows? Do trees feel any kind of phantom-limb sensations after major prunings -- or even the making of jin or shari? Can trees tell the difference between the subtle electrical fields of their caretakers and the random touch of a passerby -- or a previous caretaker? Are there subtle electric/magnetic currents from wiring or piezoelectric from limb-bending? What does a Dremel® feel like in use? Do their pots amplify or otherwise carry sonic vibrations to the roots? How does the moisture level of the soil mix affect this "hearing"? What does attention from being awarded a prize seem like for them? What does sap oozing or bleeding feel like? If a tree is too heavily pruned top or bottom, what is the sensation? If a conifer has all its green removed but still has supple limbs, how does that feel? New 10/04/09 What are the plants and rocks own "names"/self-designations? How do they perceive themselves in the wild or in compositions? What are their time frames? Do collected trees in their own ways bring down "news" from the mountains to other trees in our collections? "News" of things that happened long before those seeds were formed in the parent cones, or flavors of weathers that happened after older potted trees were collected. Do certain trees grow with less stable roots so they are more likely to be collected and become messengers for the mountains? Or if time is not so one-way, are the trees in the future sent "back" with news from the flatlands and shelves, and can these be identified by their looser roots in the rocks? Have any of us scoured an area for trees and later come back to find a specimen which was overlooked? Was that tree really overlooked or did it came from the future to provide lessons for us? Plants that can grow from cuttings, layerings or grafts: do they have a different experience of life than those plants which can only be propagated from seed and thus must go through a discreet life cycle? What is the life experience of an evergreen compared with that of a deciduous tree? needle-leaf compared with broadleafed? single-leafed compared with compound-leafed? New 11/01/08 What more can we learn about the plants' favoring of certain flavors of soil, precipitation, altitude, climate, and neighboring life-forms? New 11/01/08 How do we enhance a plant's experience by propagating it from cuttings? Is that one of our mutually agreed-upon values on this planet, the transportation and propagation of certain kinds of plants in locations and climes and times outside their usual settings, from simple seed collection and garden plots through microtissue culture and beyond? New 11/01/08 Rented plants, each eventually put in multiple, different settings, or our trees temporarily shown in a variety of exhibitions -- how do we enhance their life experiences? And what do our trees communicate between themselves at shows, especially at large-scale or international gatherings? Or the stones' experiences by being collected and transported around the globe? New 11/01/08 How often do past or future trees visit us in our dreams? New 11/01/08 How many parallel universes are populated by our trees with other branches trimmed and/or wired or cut or styled differently than we've done here? New 11/01/08 Which of these questions are based on false, partially erroneous, or not-yet-valid assumptions? We do realize that some of these questions probably incorrectly make comparisons of present day activities with those of a previous time. What further questions might be more accurately asked of those earlier enthusiasts? And how will our experiences of magical miniature landscapes change in light of the answers to these inquiries? What fundamental questions still need to be asked? |
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Again, if you have any answers or corrections or additional questions,
please contact
rjb@phoenixbonsai.com.
All who are and will be interested in this international gardening
art thank you.
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