What
do I do?
I
am often asked “So what do actually
do? Trim little trees
all day?” There is no easy answer to this. The best way is to
use the Japanese
word iro–iro which
roughly translates
as a little bit of this, little bit of that, wheeling, dealing, serving
drinks,
knocking down walls and driving a truck full of rubbish a hundred miles
away.
It is the easiest answer.
At
the moment, the start of September, summer
is leaving us
and the promised land of autumn is looming in the not too distant
future. As
I’m sure most of you are aware, there is
little to do with your Bonsai during the summer, except water, feed,
spray,
water, spray, feed. Unfortunately
this
doesn’t translate as long lazy days watching the trees slowly
grow on a hazy
summer afternoon not for me it doesn’t. Since
the end of June we have been doing soil work, which translates as
anything and
everything. Kobayashi–sensei has built an extension to the
museum at Shunkaen,
and we did a lot of the preparation for that, knocking down walls,
painting,
sawing, scaffolding, building walls that kind of thing. Also making tables, breaking
tables, a bit of
farming, some highly illegal rubbish burning at five in the morning,
scrap iron
collecting, cutting my thumb with a chainsaw: everything involved in
running a
nursery basically. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed everything I
did, and always
worked hard, as its all part of bonsai. It
isn’t sat around all day sipping green tea,
quoting Basho and meditating on the transitory nature of life (We only
do that
between 7 and 9 am weekdays, 8 and 10 weekends). It’s more
like blood, sweat
and circular saws and iro–iro.
That said, I have done my fair share of Bonsai work, especially when I
first
started. It was
very much a baptism of
fire when I arrived, just in the middle of the preparations for Satsuki
season,
lots of trees needed preparing for various shows all over the country
including
Shunkaen’s own exhibition and
working with the trees in
training. In
Working with Satsukis is very easy and also
very rewarding;
you can make something that looks quite beautiful in three or four
years. They are
also very forgiving plants, they will
let you bend them all over the shop, strip them naked, and generally
treat them
roughly; but they will withstand it, and a few months later they will
be
covered with new shoots, flowers and look something like you want them
too. When they are
flowering, they look very beautiful
and at the same time very gaudy. I’m
not
a big fan, I like them, but I prefer the small flowering varieties such
as
My
work with Bonsai is pretty much everything, from major restyling and
wiring
to more simple, yet equally as important tasks like weeding. I have
been
gradually allowed to work with more and more expensive trees when doing
restyling. This week for example I was told to wire and style an
Aka–Matsu (Red
Pine, Pinus densiflora) which had been semi–trained into a
bunjin style. I was
a bit intimidated at first because it had a lot of extraneous branches
which
gave it a very dense and heavy look. It was also very lop sided and
when left
standing, was in danger of tipping over under its own weight. After a
few
minutes of looking and thinking, I set to work with the branch cutters.
After I
had cut of a few major branches, the tree began to look like it should
do. It
took a lot of courage to do, because the tree was worth 300,000 yen,
about 1700
pounds, and I was left alone to work with it, but the fact that I was,
and I
did, and I did it reasonably well filled me with confidence and I
continued to
shape it, wire it and bend it to my own personal style. I
haven’t received any
positive comments about it, but neither have I negative comments, and
that is
the main thing. Praise is a seldom given gift, but criticism is a near
constant
kick in the knackers.
The most important job for me and my fellow apprentices is unquestionably watering. It is by far and away the most difficult thing associated with Bonsai. It is the daily battle between life and death, and so far it has been mostly life. I have had a few close calls, and some severe reprimands because of it. The importance of watering cannot be stressed enough, it is the fundamental heart of Bonsai. It isn’t just a time consuming chore which has to be done, it is the time where you communicate with the trees, when you look at them closely to see how they are doing, what they need and how you can give them it. A Bonsai can die in a day if you are careless, and that is a massive responsibility. For me, it doesn’t matter if the tree is worth a quarter of a million pounds or just a few quid; it is still a work of natural beauty. If my lack of care and attention causes it to suffer, then I should suffer accordingly. Bonsai is as complex and spiritual as it is simple and natural; the reason why we do it is for the relationship that we have with nature; the care, love and artistic expression that we put into each and every tree makes it personal. Without that love, there is nothing; and if a mistake is made, and a tree dies, you question your existence.
Quite
melodramatic perhaps, but believe me, when you are in sole charge of
three
hundred of the worlds best Bonsai, it doesn’t seems that way.
In the middle of May
I was left alone, Kobayashi sensei was away, my senior apprentice,
Akiyama–san, was at his own
nursery, and I was left holding the baby.
Previous page... 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 Next Page...
