Tess also painted her sculpture black and used it with contrasting black and white bottle-shaped vases. Her fresh material of Geranium was placed on the opposite side of the ikebana.
Greetings from Christopher
Eugenia used American Beauty berry, Callicarpa americana, Prairie Gentian, Eustoma russellianum, New Zealand flax and some other grasses in a modern black ceramic vessel.
In my Geelong class...
...Jo's exercise was to make a simplified ikebana. This means stripping the material to a minimum without loosing its essence. She used three Tulips from which she removed all but one leaf and some petals, making the stamens visible, and set them in a black suiban. The branch structure made with fine Birch stems allowed the flowers to be stand without using a kenzan.
The advanced students' exercise was to make an ikebana focussing on berries.
Ellie used "Snow berries", Gaultheria hispida, a plant endemic to the island state of Tasmania. The small pink flower on the right rear is Pieris. The blue ceramic vase has the appearance of three joined cylinders.
Helen Q used branches of Cotoneaster frigidus berries, stripped of their leaves. She contrasted them with dark Ivy, Hedera, berries. The cylindrical vase is by the ceramic artist Graeme Wilkie.
It is not officially winter until next month here. However, on the coast in the last week the temperatures have dropped. What has really made it feel wintery is the wind-chill that has made it necessary for me to rug up.
Grey skies and strong wind from the south do produce a wintery feel.
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The exercise I set for my senior students last week was to make an ikebana incorporating fruiting branches with some "unconventional material" (artificial material).
This week I set my students the exercise of making an "Autumn Ikebana". The night time temperatures have certainly started to become cooler over the last few weeks, although we have been blessed with some warm days. Thus perfect autumn weather with no wind and bright sunshine.
I must admit when I think of autumn my first thought is of the leaf colour change in many northern hemisphere deciduous plants.This thought is really a reflection of my Anglo-Australian heritage where we were taught as children that leaves in autumn would change colour. The truth is that I hardly ever saw such a thing until my teens.
This was because my childhood home, shown above in about 1960, was built on a new estate carved out of a bare paddock and exposed to salt-laden winds, particularly in winter and spring. Deciduous northern hemisphere trees could not tolerate this harsh environment. The hills in the distance are now fully covered by suburban development, their gardens predominately planted with Australian native trees and shrubs.
Judy made a one-material ikebana using branches of one of the Oak family, which are complemented by the colours in the hand-made ceramic vase.
Róża used three stems from her Blueberry bush and two Hydrangea flowers. Set in a wide ceramic bowl, this ikebana was best viewed from above.
Tess used branches of Smokebush, Cotinus, and some drying Sedum as a textural contrast, set in a hand-made ceramic vase.
Maureen had been offered some Lotus pods by a friend, which became the starting point of her ikebana. Fruiting branches or stems are another material that is appropriately suggestive of autumn. She has then added New Zealand Flax and Canna leaves to the handmade ceramic vase.
I have hung the narbong in the living room niche and placed some Dwarf Nandina domestica and Honesty, Lunaria annua, in the small bag.
This ikebana by Emily is one she described to me as her signature style. She has made a structure creating a surface composed with stems of Umbrella grass, Cyperus alternifolius, and added two stems of Crucifix orchids as focal points.