Cristmas get-together with ginger cookies and esthetics

[Attila Soos]

Go and see this:

http://www.walter-pall.de/European Spruce nr. 3 a/

This is the trial version of my new gallery. You can tell me what you think of the layout while you are there.

Walter, your new gallery is wonderful. I used to think that your old gallery lacked sophistication, and it was a shame that with such a great collection you didn't use the Internet to do the collection justice. But this latest version is really good, and your trees finally get what they deserve: a top-notch gallery.

 

[No it's not...]

Emil, Not to distract you from the road you want to take us down. However, I am having a difficult time getting past some of your statements, so I have some questions about this application. Forgive the intrusion.

What I think your going after is the idea of designing a tree with principles of art applied. I am good with that and understand. What I don't understand is since we work with in certain parameters in bonsai when designing, creating art or whatever your favorite title is. Why are we abandoning those immovable constraints, such as bending a trunk that can't be bent? Why aren't we applying these rules to a given model that has certain limitations.

I have seen this done in realtime when a bonsai image is concieved. Requiring the designer to do things to a tree that physically can't be done or jeopardizes the health of the tree. Frustrating the artist and ultimately dooming the design. As the saying goes we need to work with the tree and what it has to offer. So, shouldn't we be applying these "rules" of art to this given tree?

Once again sorry for the distraction

Good question, Tom. Basically it's up to you! If you want to stay true to what would be physically possible that's perfectly ok. If you want to go crazy that's also ok. Just give it your best to make it work "artistically".

The reason I said that either way is fine is because since there is no time constraint due to the medium we use you can use whatever horticultural tool you want, such as grafting branches or hollowing branches to bend them easier. It doesn't have to be designed as if we were doing a one time demo, but as if we owned the tree for 50 years.

Also, it's easier to artistically "think outside the box" if there are no restraints. I think most of us will stay very close to the original tree even though I said you didn't have to.

Basically it's just to shift focus from what works horticulturally to what works esthetically. With that said, it might be more interesting for the people that follow the thread if we avoid going waaay out there and create a tree where only the nebari can be recognized from the original image.

 

[Smoke]

Before anyone even thinks about drawing a picture of a fictitious tree, one should attend this prestigious art school to facilitate more artistic endeavors with pad and pencil!

This should prove entertaining....

 

[No it's not...]

Ok, here's my contribution (I might make another one later).

The bright green bows show areas wich mimics eachother. The reason for this is to keep some kind of unity and o make the bow at the top stand out less.

The red aread show the negative space. Before, the only area that was encircled was the one below the top bend. I added another one by making the "main branch" cross the trunk. The negative areas created by the branches on the other side tries to counter the visual weight of the two areas of negative space on the right side of the trunk (even though I didn't quite succeed). Visual weight is a measurement of how much attention an area/object/element wants btw, not how much something seem to weigh in pounds or something like that (duh?)

The blue rectangles shows how the direction of certain elements create a flow so to speak. It can get pretty confusing is the directions are all over the place (even though that can be useful too sometimes).

Ok, one really bad thing is that the crossing branch creates a "bar branch", i.e it splits the composition in two. I might keep this one though and see if that can be fixed in some way without changing too much.

 

[No it's not...]

Tweaked it a bit...