Team shohin display

[Smoke]

First we have to define if one wishes to keep to ideals and principles in Japan or be less formal and use the rules as a guide line.

I have two or three Gafu books and in Japan accent trees and accent plants are seldom used with a box stand. Lessor stands like bi-level or even tri-level stands are used with accent plants or accent trees on a long plinth with accent plant. Plinths with cascading trees and small single stands are often shown together with an accent plant making a three point display.

So in keeping with Japanese ideals of display with a box stand, the descending nature of the trees is to communicate with each other on a viewing plane. Since the top of the box has nothing to communicate with, it should be a formal (Apex over roots) moyogi style pine. If the tree on top has obvious movement, it takes the viewer out of the box. The purpose of the descending movement is to take the eyes thru the box.




In the first Box there are a couple trees like the second box, that don't seem to have obvious movement. In that case they fit well with the composition.

 

[Smoke]

When a tree has obvious movement and is shown wrong( even apex is flowing left), it fouls up the whole flow of the arrangement.



The poor movement is in blue and how I would rearrange the trees. In red doing away with ancillary arrangement and getting rid of the stone, especially on a low shelf. Ancillary stand is too large anyway.

 

[Smoke]

So to answer the question, cascades usually have movement which directs the eye off the stand. Formal moyogi style pines with rugged large trunks seem to convey a powerful image for the top. Likewise, a powerful juniper can also fill in for a pine on top. It should be thick trunked and display some deadwood to fill the powerful catagory.



as far as showing shohin trees in a group setting with larger trees, a good display chairperson worth his salt would never try to display shohin in a mixed group. Usually they are grouped together on a row or two of tables to be displayed properly with other same sized trees.



Groupings of trees on single stands can look rather impressive like a mixed species forest.



Many display chairpersons will arrange trees in a wave pattern. Most of the time this is done with chuin or kifu sized trees. A shohin sized tree would be lost if done like this.

 

[Smoke]

One other thing about your display (Scott) that would help is a better mix of species. This is hard but all the trees seem to have a similar canopy shape and if you squint the eye all have similar leaf size. The display would benefit from a maple and maybe a hornbeam with dissimilar leaf shape and pattern. The mixture of pot colors has been addressed.

 

[JudyB]

Must the top tree be a pine or juniper?

 

[Adair M]

Must the top tree be a pine or juniper?

The stock answer is yes.

Remember, the box is supposed to be the mountain. Only conifers live at the top of the mountain. Interestingly, and this is one of the contradictions, JBP are coastal trees, usually found near sea level! But the concept remains it should be a conifer on top, and JBP make great powerful, thick trunked shohin!

And typically it should be an informal, not Formal Upright. The idea is a tree living on top of the mountain would be subject to weather and snow which would deform the trunk to induce curves. As opposed to a tree in the valley where the weather is mild. That's where the formal uprights would be.

Cascades and semi cascades are found growing off the sides of a cliff. Halfway up. So they would be in the middle shelf of the box. Or on the "outside the box" on a tall stand.

The bottom shelf trees should have less movement, and help stabilize the composition. But all the trees should show movement pointing up towards the tree on top.

Using the box and side accent tree, the most important trees are the JBP on top, the "outside the box" tree, and the bottom tree on the opposite side from the "outside" tree. These three trees define the unequal triangle that is the major theme of bonsai styling.

 

[Adair M]

Scott,

The middle shelf drops. And the bottom shelf has two levels. The eye usually reads that "drop" as movement. Your display has the movement going from the top down to the right. Yet the shelf is higher on that side. If you were to turn the stand around, I think the flow would be better.

This shohin stuff is hard!

 

[Adair M]

I would try to place the sumo tree on the bottom shelf. The trunk is thick and conveys the feeling of weight and stability, which is what you want on the bottom.

I also noticed that all the pots within the stand are blue. Well, one is green, but the tone is very similiar to the blues.

It's nice to have one painted pot. Or, might I suggest a yellow? Lol!!!

 

[Smoke]

Must the top tree be a pine or juniper?

In Japan it probably would be, but here, I guess the sky's the limit. It should have no direction though. First tree on the left looks to be pointing the wrong way to me......

 

[JudyB]

Thanks for sharing these displays Al. I was hoping that if the tree was strong enough that it could be the top tree, even if not a pine.

 

[whfarro]

The camera pans a bit too quickly, but this gives a good feel to the variety of display options for Shohin and Mame. Some good looking trees too!

 

[markyscott]

One other thing about your display (Scott) that would help is a better mix of species. This is hard but all the trees seem to have a similar canopy shape and if you squint the eye all have similar leaf size. The display would benefit from a maple and maybe a hornbeam with dissimilar leaf shape and pattern. The mixture of pot colors has been addressed.

Thank you Al for taking the time to post all of this - very constructive advice and very much appreciated. I'm motivated now to think about the display again with a more critical and informed eye. Our challenge is that despite having a large collection of material when we got together - both stands and trees - it was clear right away that we were going to have to make compromises. There were no maples or pines among us - lots of elms and junipers with a good mix of tropicals, but the quality was quite variable. Plus I'm beginning to suspect that Dos Equis are not an acceptable substitute for Shiner.

Thanks again, Al
Scott

 

[markyscott]

Scott,

The middle shelf drops. And the bottom shelf has two levels. The eye usually reads that "drop" as movement. Your display has the movement going from the top down to the right. Yet the shelf is higher on that side. If you were to turn the stand around, I think the flow would be better.

This shohin stuff is hard!

That's a great though Adair - it's funny, but I don't think any of us considered turning the stand around. It's not my favorite stand, but one of the great things about pulling a display like this together is it really highlights weaknesses in ones collection and with the pots and stands we had available for exhibit.

Scott

 

[Adair M]

Enough Dos Equis, and the stand shelves appear level!

 

[Adair M]

In Japan it probably would be, but here, I guess the sky's the limit. It should have no direction though. First tree on the left looks to be pointing the wrong way to me......

View attachment 117540

In this display, I would be inclined to swap the top tree with the upper left.

Still, a very nice display!

One thing shohin display is supposed to do is highlight the season of the year. This is a fall display, and having the deciduous tree on the top certainly emphasizes the changing leaf color!

 

[markyscott]

In this display, I would be inclined to swap the top tree with the upper left.

Still, a very nice display!

One thing shohin display is supposed to do is highlight the season of the year. This is a fall display, and having the deciduous tree on the top certainly emphasizes the changing leaf color!

The convention is in mid-October, so the season we're trying to capture is "Still Summer". If we display between January 4th and Feburary 17th, the season is "Spring". From Febuary 18th-March 23rd it is "Almost Summer". From March 24th through October 11th, the season is "Summer".

Which is nice - only 3 more weeks of Summer to go until we're in "Still Summer".

80 degrees and 95% humidity this morning. 97 and 55% humidity this afternoon - I can't wait for Still Summer when temperatures drop down into the low 90s.

Scott

 

[Chuah]

I find that setting up a shohin display is really hard. First, you have to have a lot of trees. Second, they need to be in a variety of styles and containers. AND they need to be a variety of species. AND they need to all be looking good at the same time. AND you need lots of stands. I think they're really hard to pull off. In fact - because I only have a half dozen shohin, the stars have never aligned for me to pull one together. So I suggested to my advanced group that we pool resources and put together one from our group.

Hoe - feel free to post a picture of the trees you're bringing.

Scott

Scott,
My apology. I did not notice your post had been up for a few days. Anyway, happy to see a lot of discussions and inputs from experienced people. There are actually two team shohin displays since Hurley has two stands. I don't know whether it would be better to just do one with a more critical selection of trees, or the more team member participations the more encouraging it is.

These are my two shohin for the display you posted. I did some hair-cuts for the pyracantha and mame Chinzan azalea. I hope the berries of the pyracantha will turn red by the show. The third photo was taken last year when the berries were red.





Here is the mame Chinzan:


Ray arranged the other shohin display, which will use my two other trees, an itoigawa shimpaku and a mame Chinese elm.



I need to do some wiring on the shimpaku. The Chinese elm just begins to push out the second growth spurt, don't think will be fast enough to fill up the branches.

 

[Chuah]

"Redneck Study Group" is already taken!

Yellow pots? Redneck only uses red pots.

 

[Chuah]

Hi Solange -

The trick is to create a display that will prevent your Shohin from getting visually lost if it's juxtaposed with potentially much larger trees. A common strategy is to display your tree in a group - that's what we intend to do. But there are other strategy's as well - consider this delightful exhibit by my friend Hoe Chuah in last year's exhibit:

Scott

The whole display was 18"x 24". Every element is mame size. The wood grain shows up clearly in the photo but not that obvious in the actual display. I would probably paint the inside backdrop in cream color to add contrast and reduce the shine.

Yes I have admired that display. Why the comparative visual impact to larger trees?

Solange, I wrote a blog on how I come out with this display. I tried out different arrangements and settled on this one, a great learning experience for me. Was glad it got third in last year's LSBF "Literati"show, a miniature vs. all the tall and large literati.
https://bonsaipenjing.wordpress.com/2015/10/16/preparing-a-small-bonsai-display-for-show/

 

[Adair M]

Al posted some very nice box stands displays.

He made a couple of comments that differ from what I was taught by Daisaku.

Al said that the box top tree is usually an informal upright pine. This I agree with. But he said it should have no movement. That's where I beg to differ.

Al also stated that the box stands usually don't have an "off the box" tree with an accent. Again, I beg to differ.

But, I think I can reconcile why he says what he says with what Daisaku taught.

In my Kokufu-ten book, number 70, all the box stands are shown with a secondary tree off the box with an accent. All the box top JBP (and they all had JBP on top) DID have movement, towards the secondary tree.

So, I think it all depends on your box top tree! If it has movement, then you should have a secondary, off box tree. If your Box Top JBP has little to no movement, then you can do the box stand alone.

Regardless, the trees within the box should exhibit movement towards the box top tree. As should the off box secondary tree, should there be one.

And, I suppose all this stuff is subject to the fads of the day, much like rising or lowering hemlines.