Art vs Craft. Thoughts brought up by recent podcasts/casters. From someone who went to art school.

[Windyrockybonsai]

Also, was this whole post generated on chat GPT? Kinda sounds like it - bonsai rage bait

 

[Paradox]

Also, was this whole post generated on chat GPT? Kinda sounds like it - bonsai rage bait

Nah. You're fairly new here. Its winter, many of us have our trees under 2 feet of snow or in coldframes waiting for warmer weather.
People are bored / cant work on trees but still thinking about bonsai so we get a lot of philosophical discussions in the winter. This is one of the discussions that comes up almost every winter. Its been happening before Chat GPT was even a thing.

 

[WEI]

the topic is not new, but the entire post is AI-generated. prompting it is not especially hard either. it’s a little concerning that many can’t recognize it as such. if you wonder why the elderly fall for scam calls, here is the youth’s equivalent

AI has advanced past overuse of em-dashes. it now shows itself through hallmarks like the sequenced repetition of short, pithy sentences, often in threes, e.g.;

“Students want permission to be expressive. Institutions want relevance. Teachers worry about appearing conservative or restrictive.”

another dead giveaway is the recurring turn of phrase, e.g., “X is not Y/it’s Z”:

ex 1
“But bonsai does not need to be rescued by art discourse. It needs to be taught honestly.”

ex 2
“These demands are not ancillary to learning—they are the curriculum.”

ex 3
“This is not a failure of bonsai.
It is a failure of pedagogy.”

i could go on. and while AI is helpful in facilitating surface-level understanding, to see people use it as a substitute for the hard work of independent thought grinds my gears. use it for groceries, use it for vacation planning, use it for high-level summaries, automate those parts, even as a dialectic for learning, great, amazing, awesome - but it’s demeaning as a tool of self-expression. AI is plastic surgery on steroids. you would willingly flatten the substance of your thinking, with all the warts and flaws that make it human, into smooth, glib rhetoric?

 

[leatherback]

Also, was this whole post generated on chat GPT? Kinda sounds like it - bonsai rage bait

it was.
Does that make the topic of discussion irrelevant?

 

[BrightsideB]

Nah. You're fairly new here. Its winter, many of us have our trees under 2 feet of snow or in coldframes waiting for warmer weather.
People are bored / cant work on trees but still thinking about bonsai so we get a lot of philosophical discussions in the winter. This is one of the discussions that comes up almost every winter. Its been happening before Chat GPT was even a thing.

I agree with most that perspective. I’ve engaged but am definitely not bored. And as someone who has always engaged in trade and art it is an interesting topic.

I think it is more that during winter people tend to become more broadly introspective. That is what people are really doing on this thread for the most part. I don’t think it’s only because trees are locked away. But winter locks many things away. And causes a shift in our mentality during the cycle. It is interesting.

It’s really not a craft vs art conversation anymore. It’s become a, “I define art to be,” conversation. Which is interesting but also pretty unproductive lol.

 

[Paradox]

I agree with most that perspective. I’ve engaged but am definitely not bored. And as someone who has always engaged in trade and art it is an interesting topic.

I think it is more that during winter people tend to become more broadly introspective. That is what people are really doing on this thread for the most part. I don’t think it’s only because trees are locked away. But winter locks many things away. And causes a shift in our mentality during the cycle. It is interesting.

It’s really not a craft vs art conversation anymore. It’s become a, “I define art to be,” conversation. Which is interesting but also pretty unproductive lol.

"Bored" was not the appropriate term to use but only one I could think of at the time. But yea, winter = less time working on trees = brain doing deep dive on bonsai related topics = threads like this

The seasonal cycle of the bonsai forum

 

[Desert O'Piñon]

The seasonal cycle of the bonsai forum

My bonsai brain isn't bored, so much as it is seeking = bonsai brain in dormancy.

If bonsai brain is in dormancy, then tropical brain is moved inside,

.I think it is more that during winter people tend to become more broadly introspective.

where we shine a light on it. This produces these philosophical conversations wherein we learn things about ourselves which can improve the overall culturing of our crafty artform.

 

[Gabler]

A Craft-Education Trilogy on Bonsai​

(For Teachers, Mentors, and Serious Practitioners)

---

I. Against “Getting Good” as an Educational Endpoint​

(What We Are Actually Teaching)


In bonsai education, one of the most common instructional refrains is: “Focus on getting good first.” It is offered generously, often as a way to protect beginners from overwhelm and to anchor learning in fundamentals.


As a starting point, this makes sense.
As an endpoint, it is pedagogically thin.


Within instructional settings, “getting good” usually means learning to produce trees that are healthy, proportionally correct, stylistically legible, and recognizably competent to experienced eyes. These benchmarks are useful. They give students something to aim at. They help teachers diagnose problems. They create a shared visual language.


But when education stops there, students are trained to mistake compliance for understanding.


In many bonsai classrooms and workshops, critique functions almost entirely as correction. Branches are moved. Apexes are reduced. Pots are changed. These interventions are not wrong—but they are rarely framed as choices. They are framed as answers. Intent is often secondary, if it appears at all.


From an educational standpoint, this produces skilled technicians who are excellent at following instructions but poorly equipped to make independent judgments. They learn how to avoid mistakes, but not how to decide what matters.


This is not a failure of bonsai.
It is a failure of pedagogy.


Craft education must teach more than how to meet standards. It must teach how standards function, where they come from, and when they should be questioned—not to undermine them, but to understand their purpose.


Without this, “getting good” becomes a ceiling rather than a foundation.

---

II. In Praise of Craft as the Core Educational Value​

(Why Bonsai Should Not Be Taught Like Art)


The pressure to frame bonsai as art often enters the classroom indirectly. Students want permission to be expressive. Institutions want relevance. Teachers worry about appearing conservative or restrictive.


But bonsai does not need to be rescued by art discourse.
It needs to be taught honestly.


At its core, bonsai is a craft of responsibility. It requires long-term care, delayed gratification, and an acceptance that decisions may not reveal their consequences for years. These demands are not ancillary to learning—they are the curriculum.


In a craft-education context, “getting good” means something quite different than achieving visual sophistication. It means becoming trustworthy. It means learning to make decisions that the tree can live with. It means understanding that consistency matters more than intensity.


These are educational values that many art programs struggle to teach, but craft traditions excel at transmitting.


Standards in bonsai—proportions, styles, conventions—are not there to limit students. They exist to slow them down. They create friction against which judgment can develop. Without shared constraints, instruction collapses into preference, and preference is not teachable.


From this perspective, repetition is not remedial. Refinement is not conservative. Mastery is not a betrayal of curiosity. They are the means by which attention deepens.


For students, this can be uncomfortable. Craft does not reward quick originality. It does not validate identity through expression. It asks instead for humility, patience, and endurance.


As educators, we should not soften this demand. We should articulate it clearly—and defend it.

---

III. Against Teaching the Quantification of “Art”​

(Why This Confuses Students and Degrades the Craft)


The most damaging move in bonsai education is the attempt to quantify artistic value.


Scoring systems, ranked evaluations, and aesthetic metrics make sense when they are used to assess care, structure, and long-term viability. These tools help teachers explain cause and effect. They belong squarely within craft instruction.


They do not belong in the assessment of meaning.


When educators attempt to quantify artistry—by ranking expression, measuring beauty, or scoring innovation—they send a confused message to students. They imply that expression can be systematized, that meaning has a correct form, and that deviation must justify itself numerically.


This teaches neither art nor craft well.


From an educational standpoint, this creates three problems:

1. It replaces judgment with compliance
   Students learn how to please the system rather than how to think critically.
2. It encourages premature self-expression
   Students feel pressure to “say something” before they have developed the capacity to sustain it.
3. It undermines confidence in craft
   Craft becomes framed as preparatory or insufficient—something to move past rather than commit to.

The irony is that bonsai already teaches some of the most profound lessons craft education has to offer: care over ego, time over immediacy, responsibility over authorship. These lessons do not need artistic validation. They lose clarity when forced into that framework.


As educators, our task is not to make bonsai legible to art discourse. It is to help students understand why craft matters—and why it is hard.


If students eventually move toward art thinking, that transition should emerge organically, grounded in deep material responsibility. It should not be imposed through evaluative systems that promise objectivity where none exists.

---

A Pedagogical Reframe​

In a craft-education context, the essential questions are not:

• Is this art?
• Is this expressive enough?
• How does this score?

They are:

• Can this tree be cared for over time?
• Does the practitioner understand the consequences of their decisions?
• Is judgment improving?
• Is attention deepening?

These are teachable.
These are assessable.
And these are sufficient.


Bonsai does not need to be defended as art to be meaningful in an educational setting. It needs to be taught as what it already is: a demanding craft that asks more of its practitioners than many art forms ever will.


If students learn to embrace that without embarrassment, the rest will take care of itself.

---

I saw this post over a week ago, but I was preparing for my next semester of teaching, so I bookmarked the page to read it later and provide a thoughtful response. I am mildly disappointed for two reasons.

Firstly, I am disappointed to discover this is A.I.-plagiarized. As a result, the language is articulate, but the post lacks a clear thesis—or rather, it changes its thesis throughout. It begins by claiming that good craftsmanship is the baseline, and art is the next level, so our pedagogy should focus on craftsmanship as a firm foundation, and then move into artistry. Then it claims we should stop fighting for bonsai to be considered an art, and instead we should embrace the label of craftsmanship. Later, it moves back to pedagogy, but it emphasizes that we do not need artistry. We should instead focus on good craftsmanship. The A.I. is schizophrenic and/or dissociative insofar as it speaks from multiple points of view. Moreover, the post's discussion of pedagogy occurs entirely at the level of abstraction, without providing any concrete examples of good and bad pedagogy.

Secondly, as a result of the unclear nature of the original post, the ensuing thread rehashes the art vs craft debate. I had hoped instead that the conversation would fill in the gaps left by the A.I. plagiarist (or disagree and provide counterexamples). To be clear, I have no inherent disdain for moot arguments. I recently started a thread on the definition of the term literati, knowing at the outset that we would never arrive at a clear definition. Many of the comments attacked the thread for failing to arrive at a conclusion, as though I was unaware. Sometimes, the discourse itself is valuable as an end to itself, rather than a means to an end. The problem here is that the original post actually does a decent job stipulating definitions for arts and crafts. Regardless of how we each use the terms in our everyday conversations, for the purpose of this thread we have fairly good definitions—art is expressive whereas craft entails a deep understanding of the medium.

I hope to steer this conversation toward pedagogy. My takeaway from the original post is that we must learn the rules first in order to understand how to break them effectively. This is nothing new. However, we also need to ensure the student knows that the rules are the floor, not the ceiling. After you have finished learning the rules (which would be better described as instructional standards in this context) you have a duty to make a conscious decision whether to follow any given rule with any given tree. Accordingly, I pose the question to the goup, what does this look like in practice? I consider myself an intermediate bonsai grower. I know enough to help newbies keep their trees alive, but our most experienced members, many of whom have replied to this thread, are leagues ahead of me in terms of overall skill. How should I approach my own learning goals in my quest to improve? For the benefit of more experienced members of this site, what is the most effective way to teach bonsai to students?

 

[leatherback]

How should I approach my own learning goals in my quest to improve? For the benefit of more experienced members of this site, what is the most effective way to teach bonsai to students?

I always aim at showing people several routes can lead to good bonsai. In the end, the basic techniques and design aims are just a rout to make a well looking tree. Which form or style this takes, depends on the development timeline and imagination of the owner.

 

[Joe Dupre']

Well, I must be the odd man out, here as well as in my club. To me, bonsai is about 95% aesthetic expression. I don't place much importance at all on the Japanese tradition, rules or guidelines. Horrors! My aim is to make a tree look good....... to me. If that appeals to someone else, that is a nice treat. Yes, most of my trees have elements of classic bonsai design ONLY because they look good to me. I would not even try to teach anyone bonsai. I would suggest they teach themselves and will help with any specific problems they have. "The tree got away from me and now I don't know what to do with it." is not a question. "How do I go about bending this branch?" is a legitimate question and I'll be glad to help. I know I'll have trouble when I ask, "How big do you want this tree to be?" and they say, "I don't know.".

As I wrote earlier, I don't think you can teach artistic talent. You may be able to awaken it, if there's a spark there. Some people, sad to say have little to no talent for bonsai. I see that in dancing every week. Some people just don't have IT. No amount of practice will help.

At 71 , I've been around the block a time or two. Most of my other hobbies have involved one-of-a-kind creation. Wood turning, knife making, oil painting, fly tying, traditional archery equipment making (longbows, arrows, quivers,) leatherwork, boat building, etc, etc. etc. The "creation" part of those hobbies was always the easy part. Learning the skills to fulfil the visions was a little more taxing.

 

[Gabler]

Well, I must be the odd man out, here as well as in my club. To me, bonsai is about 95% aesthetic expression. I don't place much importance at all on the Japanese tradition, rules or guidelines. Horrors! My aim is to make a tree look good....... to me. If that appeals to someone else, that is a nice treat.

I understand the appeal of self-gratification, but what's the benefit of a bonsai forum if we can't teach bonsai? Not to mention, how do you keep your trees alive if all you care about is expression?

 

[Joe Dupre']

I understand the appeal of self-gratification, but what's the benefit of a bonsai forum if we can't teach bonsai? Not to mention, how do you keep your trees alive if all you care about is expression?

Teaching is an option, not a requirement. There will always be ones that want to teach. Art is not self-gratification...........at least not in a self-centered kind of way. I love the look, smell, feel and artistry of bonsai. I love to talk to my friends and fellow club members about bonsai. I love to read what other forum members are into. I pick up valuable hints from this forum and hopefully pass on a few that I've used. My feeling......my PERSONAL feeling.... is that everyone be allowed to do bonsai in their own way. It might not be my way, and that's OK.

 

[sono_ben]

Less talk, more action. If we spend our time doing we wouldn’t have to worry about the definition of words. There are as many definitions as there are people. We learn by doing and failing and failing less the next time.

I agree - I just don't have much to do in the winter