Who gets credit for a bonsai tree?

[Gabler]

I have always wondered why it's acceptable to buy a nearly-finished tree, style it, and enter it into a show under your name. If that's the convention, then fine, I'll go along with it, yet it's not what I would have chosen, nor others I've spoken with in meat space about this topic. I'm guessing it's an artifact of Japanese culture.

If the nebari and trunk are the most important part of a bonsai tree, then at least some credit should go to the original grower—listed somewhere under the owner's name on the show placard. Any intermediate owners should also appear, for that matter. I would love to see the full provenance of trees on display. I would hazard a guess that everyone here would also appreciate the additional information. Most displays I've seen already include the estimated age of a collected tree alongside the year training began, so we clearly have a problem taking credit for an act of God. Just list a couple of extra names on the display placard for completeness.

Thoughts?

 

[Dav4]

While I get extreme pleasure from showing a tree that has been all or almost all my work, I do have trees that have been worked on in the past by paid professionals, and I still really enjoy showing those as well. I also feel that attempting to list the full provenance of a tree wouldn't really be helpful. As an example, I have a Douglas Fir that I acquired from a hobbyist at the 2021 NBE. The story was that it was initially collected by Todd Schlafer who may or may not have done some initial work on it. It then ended up in Ryan Neil's hands at Mirai where it was worked/styled and ended up in a Horst pot. The hobbyist who sold it to me bought it at, I believe, the 2019 NBE. Since being on my bench, Tyler Sherrod has worked on it once or twice, but hasn't touched it in almost two years. Meanwhile, I have been working on it, repotted it two springs ago, and will be rewiring it next fall. Anyway, that's a lot of provenance to put on a placard. Ultimately, it's my tree, so keeping it simple makes sense imo. If someone were to ask me, I'll gladly let them know about the tree anyway.

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

Not who, what. It’s about the tree.

Ever watch a dog show? Notice how the attention is on the dog, the handler is visible from the knee down, and the owner is in the audience?

If you go to a bonsai exhibition, you want to see killer trees regardless of provenance. If a tree sucks, who cares if it’s one hack’s work for 30 years?

 

[Dav4]

Not who, what. It’s about the tree.

Ever watch a dog show? Notice how the attention is on the dog, the handler is visible from the knee down, and the owner is in the audience?

If you go to a bonsai exhibition, you want to see killer trees regardless of provenance. If a tree sucks, who cares if it’s one hack’s work for 30 years?

Your highlighted statement is so obvious, I didn't even think to bring it up, but I couldn't agree with you more.

 

[Bonsai Nut]

If you see the big koi shows in Japan, sometimes the owner doesn't even see their fish until it wins a big award

The only time I think an exception could be made is if someone grew or otherwise collected a tree and did 100% of the work by themself. Similar to calling out a special pot or special brush painting, I think it is fine to say "collected by artist from rural landscape in NC" or something similar. I don't mind reading about provenance if it makes sense. I certainly wouldn't post anything like "Purchased from Brussels Bonsai 2018"

 

[The Barber]

I think I prefer to talk to the owner of the tree about the provenance, some trees would need a huge placard to cover the provenance, some don't. A big one would feel like a bulletin board to me and distract from a display, and the lack of uniformity throughout a bonsai show would murder my ocd.

 

[rockm]

The tree display placards at the National Bonsai Museum have who donated the tree and years in bonsai training. This is basic info that serves as a thumbnail of a trees provenance and history. More info is available but putting it all upfront on a plaque can mean a very large plaque

 

[Bonsai Nut]

The tree display placards at the National Bonsai Museum have who donated the tree and years in bonsai training. This is basic info that serves as a thumbnail of a trees provenance and history. More info is available but putting it all upfront on a plaque can mean a very large plaque

Yes definitely. If you can't say it in one line, it should be said somewhere else.

Though I have never seen it, I could see how it would be cool to have a small sign by each display with a QR Code that linked to a web page where each artist could fill in info about the display, the plant species used, the provenance, etc. That way you could be as wordy as you wanted, it wouldn't distract from the exhibition experience, and viewers could stop and scan the code and read further if they wished.

 

[DonielDoom]

Not who, what. It’s about the tree.

This 100%.

Logistical thought along the train of 'not enough room on the placard' - where do all the extra hands get credited? The apprentices etc. It does not seem often that a single pair of hands creates a (show) tree.

My opinion is that we in the west have a culturally different connection to bonsai. It's often more about us(the creators). Our mainstream western religions tend to be human-centric (god resembles a human shape) whereas eastern religions tend to be naturalistic (gods resemble shapes of nature like flora/fauna). I think this pulls the celebration in western eyes towards the human behind the tree who made it vs the tree in front of some humans.

I mean no offense by this crude expression and welcome dialogue. Bringing religion up with such assumptions scares me...

 

[Colorado]

Not who, what. It’s about the tree.

Ever watch a dog show? Notice how the attention is on the dog, the handler is visible from the knee down, and the owner is in the audience?

If you go to a bonsai exhibition, you want to see killer trees regardless of provenance. If a tree sucks, who cares if it’s one hack’s work for 30 years?

This is how I think about it. Well said, Brian.

There seems to be an obsession with some folks in the bonsai community about “credit” which kind of misses the whole point of bonsai, in my opinion.

 

[Rivian]

This is how I think about it. Well said, Brian.

There seems to be an obsession with some folks in the bonsai community about “credit” which kind of misses the whole point of bonsai, in my opinion.

Need to know who done it to know who's worth listening to

 

[rockm]

Yes definitely. If you can't say it in one line, it should be said somewhere else.

Though I have never seen it, I could see how it would be cool to have a small sign by each display with a QR Code that linked to a web page where each artist could fill in info about the display, the plant species used, the provenance, etc. That way you could be as wordy as you wanted, it wouldn't distract from the exhibition experience, and viewers could stop and scan the code and read further if they wished.

The museum has an audio tour with similar coding if I remember right.

 

[Bonsai Nut]

There seems to be an obsession with some folks in the bonsai community about “credit” which kind of misses the whole point of bonsai, in my opinion.

If I know a tree has been styled by @Brian Van Fleet it immediately looks nicer to me

 

[WNC Bonsai]

I guess I’m kind of a hardass on this since I think it should be spelled out how much work the current owner has put into growing and styling a tree. It comes down to whether your philosophy on showing trees is whether a tree is just evaluated based on the tree alone or the styling and capabilities of the owner as well. I suppose there can be shows just focused on the trees and how good an example of the art they are as opposed to shows that combine that with how good a job the owner did in growing and styling the trees. I have heard that in some shows there are areas reserved for trees that are just displayed and not judged and that’s where trees having been professionally grown and styled should be. But then where do you draw the line at how much work the current owner has contributed, 25%, 50%, 75%? And how would you even gage that? It does tickle me though when I see trees at our local show beat out very expensive professionally grown and trained trees for best tree.

 

[MrBonsai19]

You say “style a nearly finished tree” as if this is an easy or trivial thing to do at a high level.

Your post also asks a question that is completely different from the title.

1 - is it acceptable to buy a well developed tree and then submit it to a show? Of course!! Simply providing for the opportunity to take something exciting and present it to the public is commendable even if you haven’t even styled the tree at all. Kudos for finding and bringing all of us something beautiful to look at.

2 - Who gets credit? Straw man argument. having your name on the display card or even having your name on the award is not the same as getting credit for making the tree. Maybe you made it maybe you didn’t. It’s very easy within the bonsai community to learn about a trees history simply by talking to the owner. Nobody is taking credit for anything simply by saying they currently own and care for the tree.

 

[PaulH]

For me, the joy of bonsai is doing the work on my trees myself. I'm well aware that most winners at big shows are the work of professionals for owners with $$ to spend. I think it would be appropriate to acknowledge to pro who did the work over the owner who just writes the check.

 

[rockm]

I guess I’m kind of a hardass on this since I think it should be spelled out how much work the current owner has put into growing and styling a tree. It comes down to whether your philosophy on showing trees is whether a tree is just evaluated based on the tree alone or the styling and capabilities of the owner as well. I suppose there can be shows just focused on the trees and how good an example of the art they are as opposed to shows that combine that with how good a job the owner did in growing and styling the trees. I have heard that in some shows there are areas reserved for trees that are just displayed and not judged and that’s where trees having been professionally grown and styled should be. But then where do you draw the line at how much work the current owner has contributed, 25%, 50%, 75%? And how would you even gage that? It does tickle me though when I see trees at our local show beat out very expensive professionally grown and trained trees for best tree.

So extrapolate this. As a tree grows and ages how do you gauge the amount of work put in by an increasingly long list of artists/artisans/collectors or even beginners. How can you gauge their impact collectively since those “show trees” you seem to disdain have had perhaps a century of work in them. For instance. Does the purge of dense tertiary branching that took place over five year two decades ago count as 70percent of the total work. Even if it was done badly?
Just wondering where your judgement t stops or begins.

 

[Gabler]

Though I have never seen it, I could see how it would be cool to have a small sign by each display with a QR Code that linked to a web page where each artist could fill in info about the display, the plant species used, the provenance, etc. That way you could be as wordy as you wanted, it wouldn't distract from the exhibition experience, and viewers could stop and scan the code and read further if they wished.

Come to the Brandywine Bonsai Society show at Longwood Gardens in June or in September. The tree guide could have had more information in my opinion, but we used a QR code.

 

[Gabler]

This 100%.

Logistical thought along the train of 'not enough room on the placard' - where do all the extra hands get credited? The apprentices etc. It does not seem often that a single pair of hands creates a (show) tree.

My opinion is that we in the west have a culturally different connection to bonsai. It's often more about us(the creators). Our mainstream western religions tend to be human-centric (god resembles a human shape) whereas eastern religions tend to be naturalistic (gods resemble shapes of nature like flora/fauna). I think this pulls the celebration in western eyes towards the human behind the tree who made it vs the tree in front of some humans.

I mean no offense by this crude expression and welcome dialogue. Bringing religion up with such assumptions scares me...

This was my suspicion, too.

 

[Gabler]

You say “style a nearly finished tree” as if this is an easy or trivial thing to do at a high level.

My apologies for the lack of clarity. I did not mean to imply styling a tree is easy. I merely mean the trunk and nebari are equally important.