Is inverse taper a deal-breaker for you?

[penumbra]

Everyone accepts that there is one best view of a tree.

Doesn't ring true for me either.

 

[leatherback]

Everyone accepts that there is one best view of a tree.

As long as people cannot tell which is the front of the tree, I think this might not be true.
Had someone at my local clb tell me thought one branch looked a little out of place. He did not realize he was looking at "the back"

 

[Forsoothe!]

They don't have to agree on which view is best to agree that there is one view that is better than the rest. There are occasionally trees that have more than one good view.

 

[penumbra]

There are occasionally trees that have more than one good view.

One of the reasons I like round pots.

 

[Joe Dupre']

Ok, I guess my right brain is kicking in again. Words like "good", "best", "better" , etc. seem to be subjective and so are the opinion of the artist or the viewer. To consider them an objective standard seems all wrong to me. If you greatly value the traditional bonsai method and techniques, then I guess they would be an objective truth. To me, bonsai is something more than what some long-dead Japanese master did 200 years ago and declared as the "right" way. Bonsai is, I think ,an art form that can grow and change at the will of the artist. If your opinion differs, that's OK . I still enjoy seeing trees and techniques from both sides of the fence.

 

[Joe Dupre']

Maybe I need to revise my answer as I like this tree and I’m pretty sure this counts as reverse taper. More growing to do on this one but I’m looking forward to it!

View attachment 404173

I like it too. It has gobs of personality. Show winner? Probably not. Would I dig it if I found it on the roadside? Most definitely yes.

 

[Cajunrider]

I like it too. It has gobs of personality. Show winner? Probably not. Would I dig it if I found it on the roadside? Most definitely yes.

I dig it too, literally and figuratively.

 

[Haroldjr]

This mulberry has a rather chubby mid-section. Excuse the ratty leaves. I just went out and took a quick pic. This is two season's growth from a complete stump. The top definitely has to grow into a more gradual taper, but I like the vibe the tree puts out. I really can't carve any of the inverse taper out of it because most of the back side of the tree is already carved out from a huge branch that died out.

View attachment 403767

Nice I wish I could my mulberry to come out. What am I doing wrong? Couple of leaves come out and die back.

 

[Joe Dupre']

Nice I wish I could my mulberry to come out. What am I doing wrong? Couple of leaves come out and die back.

Has this happened this whole growing season? Usually mulberries are vigorous growers. Just a wild guess..........too big of a pot and/or soil staying too wet. What kind of soil are you using?

 

[Haroldjr]

Has this happened this whole growing season? Usually mulberries are vigorous growers. Just a wild guess..........too big of a pot and/or soil staying too wet. What kind of soil are you using?

Non organic on the soil. So it drains fast. Pot is pretty small. I am carefull with the water or try to be. It has always been very slow to take off and even bud out. Light maybe?

Thanks Joe

 

[leatherback]

They don't have to agree on which view is best to agree that there is one view that is better than the rest.

Interesting philosophical point. But I do not think I agree

IF they agree there is one view that is better than the rest, but they do not agree which view that is, indirectly they agree there is not ONE best view, right?

 

[leatherback]

Non organic on the soil. So it drains fast. Pot is pretty small. I am carefull with the water or try to be. It has always been very slow to take off and even bud out. Light maybe?

Thanks Joe

Please do not blow up on my again, but.. May I recommend starting a separate thread for this question, and share some more information on where/how you keep it. And, if you update your profile with your USDA climate zone, people can give more pointed recommendations.

 

[Joe Dupre']

That makes sense now. Full non-organic soil in a small pot will dry out fast and doesn't hold nutrients for long. This spring I'd suggest a little bigger pot and 50/50 on the organic/inorganic soil. Small, sifted pine bark works fine for the organics. The inorganic component you're using now should work fine also. Maybe save the full inorganic soil for later in the tree's developement. If it was my tree, I'd try to work a bit of pine bark into the soil all around the tree without disturbing the roots and keep it well watered.

 

[jradics]

Would inverse taper make you pass by a gnarly tree that is truly a great find in all other aspects? I collect much of my material on the roadsides and other disturbed areas. I get some really killer, character-laden trees that sometimes have a bit ( or a lot ) of inverse taper. It doesn't bother me in the least if I like the movement and character of the tree. To some, that "flaw" would be a glaring fault they would be turned off by every time they look at the tree. No right or wrong answer here...........just seeing how y'all feel about Are

 

[jradics]

Would inverse taper make you pass by a gnarly tree that is truly a great find in all other aspects? I collect much of my material on the roadsides and other disturbed areas. I get some really killer, character-laden trees that sometimes have a bit ( or a lot ) of inverse taper. It doesn't bother me in the least if I like the movement and character of the tree. To some, that "flaw" would be a glaring fault they would be turned off by every time they look at the tree. No right or wrong answer here...........just seeing how y'all feel about it.

Are you growing trees to impress "them" or to feed your passion? I'm sure my stuff would be laughed out of a show but I like it. That's all that matters to me

 

[Joe Dupre']

Are you growing trees to impress "them" or to feed your passion? I'm sure my stuff would be laughed out of a show but I like it. That's all that matters to me

I do bonsai mainly for me. It's very nice when someone else likes my trees, but it's not necessary for me. Our club shows are not judged. The shows are free to the public to raise interest in the hobby. If they ever start judging, I'd bring the same type of trees and style them with no eye on winning. I rather dislike the whole idea of competition. Competition is no doubt helpful and necessary in some endeavors, just not my preference.

 

[leatherback]

Are you growing trees to impress "them" or to feed your passion? I'm sure my stuff would be laughed out of a show but I like it. That's all that matters to me

As you continue on a path you often find that the more you understand and know, the more specific your tastes become. To avoid reaching a state where you decide, none of my trees progress beyond a certain state, it might be good to also listen to what others, who have walked the same path you are walking on, think about certain things.

 

[chicago1980]

Mostly not an issue for me.

 

[Joe Dupre']

I fail to see how fixing the inverse taper would diminish any of those things. The story behind the tree is still the same except for the addition of “and then I fixed the inverse taper on the base of the trunk by ground layering,” to the ending of the story.

If you’re saying that this story is told in the appearance of the tree, I have to disagree that a viewer could “read” that story in the visual language of the tree’s form, line, color, texture, positive and negative space, etc. without having been explicitly told the story via another medium. I’m not saying it’s not valid to just like the tree this way. It absolutely is perfectly valid to style your tree however it pleases you. I’m just saying that intention alone is insufficient to tell a story. That requires communication and communication depends upon shared cultural interpretation of signs. Signifiers have to be present and be evocative of what is signified for the audience viewing the work in order for communication to have taken place. I just don’t see anything inherent in the form of the tree that would lead me to infer that it was close to your home or that it was found 6 feet from a busy road if you hadn’t told me any of those things through the medium of English language prose.

Well, that all may be true if I wanted the tree to tell a story to the viewer. That really doesn't enter my mind when I design a tree. The shape and feel has to appeal to me only. If someone gets some pleasure out of seeing it, that's a welcome bonus. I will remember the story.........where I found it............what it looked like sitting there all shredded and forlorn..........how much I had to remove to get it into that shape. That's my reason for doing bonsai. It may not be for everyone, and that's ok.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

Well, that all may be true if I wanted the tree to tell a story to the viewer. That really doesn't enter my mind when I design a tree. The shape and feel has to appeal to me only. If someone gets some pleasure out of seeing it, that's a welcome bonus. I will remember the story.........where I found it............what it looked like sitting there all shredded and forlorn....Attach files......how much I had to remove to get it into that shape. That's my reason for doing bonsai. It may not be for everyone, and that's ok.

I had not responded to this thread when it was new, just got a new laptop, need to do some two hands, ten finger typing to break it in. Keyboard on the old laptop had quit working, had been doing the one finger pecking on the "virtual keyboard" for quite a while. It feels good to use all my fingers for typing again. LOL

@Joe Dupre' - I "gotta" bust your chops a little. If the ONLY person you did bonsai for was yourself, and yourself was your only source of your aesthetics, you would not be posting here on BNut, you also would not be a member of your local bonsai club , and you would not be exhibiting trees in your local shows. But you do exhibit, you do belong to your local club, and you do post here. Proof positive that your bonsai aesthetics are informed by external sources beyond yourself, you do care what others think. It is okay, it is a good thing to participate and to care what others think. This is part of being a member of the human tribe. We do care. Its in our nature to care. No man is really "an island". Art and aesthetics are part of, or are an extension of language, language is how we communicate. I know I am not consciously thinking of others when I design a tree, but yet, I do know that I want others to "see" what I see when I look at my tree. This does mean by extension, I am thinking of others when I design the tree. Its all there.

I was a student judge in the American Orchid Society judging program. I lasted all of 1 year. I left due to schedule issues, I might go back now that I am retired. The discussion of "Inverse Taper" parallels nicely the AOS topic of judging "Fatal Flaws" in orchid flowers. For example, size of a flower is only 25 points on the 100 point scoring scale for most orchid flowers. But for many judges it is the FIRST 25 points, in general, if a flower is known to average 10 cm in natural spread, if the flower submitted isn't at least 0.5 cm larger than 10 cm, no matter how good other traits like color or form are, the flower will get passed over. Another such trait is "floriferousness" meaning flower count for orchids that normally have more than one flower per stem. If the average is 5 flowers, a plant with 4 flowers or 3 flowers will generally not get judged even though flower count is only 10 or 15 points. These are all "Fatal Flaws", in that even though they contribute relatively small percentages to the total point counts in scoring an orchid in judging, not making the "perceived minimum" in these categories simply disqualifies an orchid from being judged.

Similarly, in bonsai, "Inverse Taper" seems to have similar properties to a "Fatal Flaw", it is tolerated to some degree in trees with other redeeming traits, but at some point it becomes the "Fatal Flaw" which if inverse taper is noticeable enough, it kills any chance of the tree being judged as a good tree, no matter how good other traits are.