Could imagine an international bonsai exhibition I guess, all the best trees worldwide you've ever seen pics of. Then imagine how good a tree would have to be to be accepted into the show with the rest.
Would have to be pretty damn good right?
The standard probably rises a bit every year, bar keeps on going up. I'll bet a lot of trees being called world class ten years ago are just national class now.
And the trees change.
In Japan they have this honorary title for some trees: "Important Bonsai Masterpiece". The tree has a little medallion that always hangs on it. I don't know how many there are, maybe (probably!) Bill Valalvanis would know. Now, I've seen some pictures of these trees when they look pretty rough! Then someone comes along and styles it, and PRESTO! Awesomeness!!! I think one of Bjorn's videos documents him working on one.
Some trees are beautiful just because they're beautiful. Some because of the Provenance. (The Hiroshima Tree comes to mind).
There are a lot of really, really nice trees. This past year at Kokofu-ten, they had two shows. They do that every 10 years. So instead of the usual ~250 trees, they had ~500! And none were shown last year!
There are rules about how often a tree can be shown at Kokofu. And rules about if it has won before, it cant be considered for the top prize again! (Again, Bill V knows all the rules!)
Here's an interesting thing: you would think that a tree that recently won Kokofu would be extremely valuable, right? Well, not exactly! Sure, it's valuable, and it will always be famous for it, but here's the thing: the guys who own the trees want to win! Not necessarily own a winning tree! So they will pay MORE for a top contender that MIGHT win than they will for a tree that just won!
While we are on interesting Kokofu stuff, there a famous pot that gets used by a different tree every year. Said to be worth over a $1Million dollars. The owner rents it out for use in the show. $100,000!
Everyone always looks forward to see what tree gets to be shown in it each year!