Thank you all... I am honored and humbled by your enthusiastic response to my offering. Mike, you could knock me over with a feather at the moment - special thanks for your haiku my friend...
Since most of us used to play at BT.. many who have been around a long time knew me when I was still busy killing home depot junipers that had been styled into the MOST appalling forms that defied gravity and logic
.... so to have my first try at this so well received by a group of my much admired and even loved peers, warms my heart.. and I am full of gratitude for your collective kindness.
Rock... you are absolutely correct about the placement of the scroll... I wish I would have had more space to do the whole display for the photo shoot, but I could have managed to get it up higher and I was distracted by what I saw (the relative height of the scroll to everything else in totality - it's trimmed out of the photo)... and I did not keep in mind the positioning of the most important thing in the scroll... the moon. Thank you for that observation. I will be sure to not make that error again.
Tom... I'm glad you liked the kusamono... I'm pretty fond of it myself.
Now one thing I wanted to point out is that I have NO control over the background at the Exhibition... so I imagine it will be nuetral... I just wanted to take the different photos because I was so struck by how much it changed the mood of the whole thing. Literally night and day... and both have their merits and their faults.
The satsuki is a 'kaho'... not that you'd know it to see the facing flowers... though some on the back have the pinks. There are some buds, so maybe it'll actually get there with some flowers... It started blooming in April... and things were well under way to be well and truly done before it had to go... so I did make the decision not to waste energy on the flowers if it wasn't going to show with them, and instead I decided to focus on health, form, and the overall display. Then not a week after I took out the flower buds, the weather changed.... it got cold, wet, and dark... and it's stayed that way. There's actually some sun at the moment and it's 63 degrees... it's been more like 40-53 for the lows and highs. So it brought the flowering to a virtual crawl.
It may end up with flowers, and that would be nice, as long as it's enough... so we'll see... did I make the right choice...?? Maybe maybe not... but what I do know is that the tree is very lush and quite happy... so no matter what I lost out on seeing, there is no way I can count it a truly bad decision.
The tree will be going by refridgerated truck which is taking all the trees from the NW out East and picking up others along the northern route. It's being paid for by the Exhibition... with an option to donate some money to help off-set the cost of the price to send the trees east.
Wayne... thanks for the compliment on the photography... I know you have mad skillz in that arena yourself.
Warmest regards to all,
Victrinia
