When does a tree in a pot ‘become’ a Bonsai?

With the gold standard of an apprenticeship in Japan out of reach of most budding bonsai masters, are we overlooking a more home-grown resource to bring on the next generation of bonsai artists.

Demo’s are the mainstay of most bonsai exhibitions worldwide, inviting well known artists to perform is considered an essential to increase attendance to a show. But will watching a demo actually improve your skill or are they there for entertainment or worse? I have been told that watching the demo is a chance to have a sit down eat your sandwiches!

Why do the general public has such a distorted perception of bonsai. I am sure we have all had the same experience; you are introduced to someone and polite conversation flows and they enquire, “What do you do in your spare time” you tell them that you enjoy Bonsai and they invariably reply “I had a Bonsai once…it died” some times they respond with “Bonsai… aren’t those are the little Japanese trees they sell in the Mall, you have to trim the roots don’t you?”

Lets consider the vocabulary used in Bonsai: it’s artists and jargon. Do we maintain the Japanese terminology or, if the art is to reach a wider audience should fewer Japanese terms be used to explain the art?

Art is generally understood to be the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power, I would say that Bonsai does fit comfortably into this definition except where practitioners do not use their imagination.

Very good bonsai will still depend upon talent, experience, and imagination, as well as a general conformity to the rules of bonsai… however you are remembered for the rules you break. What is most important is that the tree is pleasing to the viewer and whatever elements are used within the display they do not take precedence, the Bonsai MUST always be the focus.

I recently I posed the question “When does a tree in a pot ‘become’ a Bonsai?” to Bonsai friends worldwide, some professional bonsai artists and some just beginning to create beautiful trees, I received many answers listen to them here

This is a reading from one of my favourite books: Wandering: Notes and Sketches by Hermann Hesse... There is nothing more important to our existence than trees, for they are connected to the very air we share. "When we have learned how to listen to trees, then the brevity and the quickness and the childlike hastiness of our thoughts achieve an incomparable joy.”

It doesn’t take a lot of searching on the internet to find a legion of sites that claim to be able to “teach” you bonsai. YouTube in particular is peppered with such sources, some of which are extremely good but many of which fall very short of the mark in terms of the tuition given. This is often because the videos are poor quality, or because the presenter is not good at public speaking. Even worse, however, are the rather many sites that give the viewer information that is quite simply wrong.

If we are to create our own national or regional identity in bonsai, then surely that should include having our own potters create the pots is a must? Why is still considered more prestigious to use old Japanese and Chinese containers when there are potters across Europe whose quality matches the pots coming out of Japan?