A VARITEY of SOGETSU IKEBANA STYLES

This week I set my Geelong students the Sogetsu curriculum exercise of 'Using leaves only'. I enjoy this exercise as it is one in which we are encouraged to look carefully at the material and observe its natural qualities of colour, texture and pliability. 

The text book says '...leaves can give an entirely different impression by showing their reverse side...'. We are encouraged to explore their plasticity by, '...cutting, tearing, rolling or overlapping them...'. This comment brings to my mind the caution of Mr Umemura at a workshop once, when he said that if you are going to change the appearance of leaves then you have to enhance their beauty, because nature made them perfect in the first place.

Ellie has used a large 'fan' palm leaf, characterised by radiating lines, against which she has contrasted Maranta leuconeura leaves, the reverse side of which are a deep maroon.

Christine arranged two Strelitzia leaves in a dark grey rectangular box-shaped vessel. She has added rolled and knotted maroon Cordyline leaves in the fold of the front Strelitzia leaf, to create a quirky modern arrangement. The tip of another cordyline leaf projects to the right from the second strelitzia leaf.

On Monday I attended the Annual General Meeting of the Victorian Branch of the Sogetsu School of Ikebana (SSIV). We were pleased to welcome 38 members, including 5 new and 2 returning members over the last 12 months. Following the meeting a workshop was led by Angeline Lo on the theme of a 'No kenzan' arrangement in a suiban. 

This is my re-constructed arrangement at home. I used some pittosporum branches that were quite fine and rather flexible; probably not the best material for the exercise. For the focal point I used some unidentified blue flowers. More photos can be seen at SSIV AGM meeting.

 

A couple of weeks ago I found a single stem of Belladonna flowers, Amaryllis belladonna growing by the nearby creek. In our garden the flowers have not appeared, because of the extra dry season. My grandmother always associated this flower with my birthday in mid-February. 

I picked the flower and arranged it with the blue-grey leaves of a succulent in a rarely used bowl. The bowl is by Ray Pearce a very skilled and imaginative potter who has lived and worked in the Bendigo area for many years.

A week later the some of the flowers had drooped so I re-worked the arrangement. It was good to get some extra life out of these long-lasting materials. 


Greetings from Christopher
23rd February 2019

COOLING WATER in SUMMER

    

The exercise I set in the first class, this year, for my advanced students was a 'summer arrangement emphasising water'. This is a lovely exercise at this time of year and invites the use of glass vessels or suibans that show  an expansive surface of water. 

Of course there are other more tangential ways of doing the exercise. Below are four examples from different classes.

Kim has gone for a rather minimalist approach, using a shallow glass serving dish. It is not clear in the photo, but he has filled the small recess in the centre of the dish with water. He then placed three short, cut stems at one end of the dish. Teasingly, he has placed a single aspidistra leaf underneath the other end of the dish.

Gianna has used an extra large black suiban, in which she has arranged two gardenias as a focal point in a design created with four stems placed across the vessel. 

Val has arranged two pale orange roses under the water in a small rectangular glass vase.

Margaret has used a tall glass cylinder, in which she has floated the large outer petals of an intense pink gerbera. The, now smaller, remainder of the flower sits at the opening of the vase. These elements are contrasted with the line of a vine, which has green leaves with a variegated white patterning.

On Monday last week I attended the first meeting for 2019 of Ikebana International Melbourne Chapter. The guest speaker was a sumi-e (Japanese ink brush painting) artist, Emi Kamataki. Members were asked to make ikebana arrangements reflecting this subject. 

I thought I would use bamboo as this is such a beautiful and popular subject in sumi-e. A particularly attractive variety is growing through our fence from a neighbour's garden. It has variegated pale stems with fine green longitudinal lines. 

It was the first time I remember using fresh bamboo in ikebana, as the leaves curl very rapidly after picking; but not, however, if you use the following technique recommended to me by a couple of my students: Cut the bamboo early in the morning. When you have brought it inside, cut the stem again underwater and immediately place it in a mug half-filled with hot water containing a teaspoon of dissolved salt. Leave it in the salty water for at least 15 minutes and then place in room temperature fresh water.

My simple ikebana has two tall stems with most of the leaves removed to emphasise the stems. Lower leaves conceal the kenzan and some small off-white begonia flowers create a focus at the edge of the suiban.

See more photos from the meeting at the following link, Ikebana International Melbourne.

Greetings from Christopher
17th February 2019

FRESH AND DRIED MATERIALS

This afternoon I had walk in the Royal Botanic Gardens in Melbourne...

...and was greeted by this planting of cosmos in the rose garden bed. 

I had gone into the Gardens as I was curious to see what colour the flowers on a huge bromeliad were. I had noticed its flower spike developing a few weeks ago.

  

            

To my surprise, they were white. The flowers of many of the smaller species of bromeliads are highly colourful and often strange looking. None-the-less, this large variety is beautiful and spectacular for its size. The flower spike was a good 2 metres tall. This seems to be an Alcantarea species in the Bromeliad family.

The afternoon was perfect and I was not the only one enjoying the surrounds of the Gardens.

Meanwhile, back in Torquay, each day as I walk into the entrance of our house I pass a bunch of dried Honesty seed pods, Lunaria annua. I had gathered the seeds from my niece’s garden, which is in a much wetter part of Victoria than Torquay. To succeed, I had to grow them in a pot with a good water reservoir. 

I remember in my childhood being delighted by the septums of these seed pods which are translucent discs with a silvery sheen, as shown in this detail above from an earlier arrangement. They were a popular item in the dried arrangements of the 1960s.

What I have enjoyed in seeing them every day is the texture and colour of the seed pod covering. It is a purply-mauve with a rather parchment like texture. Because the dried material is so stiff I have avoided arranging it. However, I thought the colour was beginning to fade and decided to use it before I missed the opportunity. 

My intention was that the focus of my arrangement would be texture as much as colour. This brought to mind the velvety brown heads of the bullrushes in the creek. I gathered some that are fairly thin and which had an unusual curve. 

Because of the relatively deep colours of the materials I decided to use a tall black nageire vessel with two side openings. This enabled me to seperate the ikebana into two distinct but complementary sides. One being for massed dried materials and the other fresh materials with a linear form. An arrangement using both Fresh and Dried Materials is a Sogetsu School curriculum exercise. I have added two long green leaves for their fresh appearance on the right and two artichoke heads on the left side for their colour and mass. One of the artichokes is obscured in this photograph.

Greetings from Christopher

10th February 2019

SOME EUCALYPTUS FLOWERS

We are expecting a top of 37 degrees celsius today... 

...and so decided to have an early morning walk on the beach before breakfast. The cloudless sky meant that the overnight temperature was low and the house should remain fairly cool. Because we have daylight saving at this time of year I was able to do some watering in the garden after dinner last night. The potted plants have water in their saucers and should survive the heat.

A couple of days ago while out for a walk I noticed the bright yellow-green flowers on a eucalyptus, possibly E. macrandra. 

The flowers were very bright with the late afternoon sun directly on them. They grow in clusters which are quite heavy. As they are borne on fine stems they tend to hang beautifully.

The flower growth is similar to, but smaller and finer than, the Bushy Yate, E.lehmanii, having a long operculum or bud cap covering the stamens. In the photo above you can see the stamens at the base of the cap before it is forced off by their growth. Notice the one in the centre of the photo and then look at the next image.
  

I removed the cap and the stamens immediately fanned out, and over the next few hours spread further. Another feature of this intriguing flower is that it has a beautiful sweet scent that carries well within the room, making the plant an interesting ikebana subject. 

In this simple ikebana I have arranged three of the stems, removing most of the leaves in the process. The tall bottle-shaped vase of yellow glass has a gentle 'S' curve going to the right toward the top. I therefore counterbalanced this movement by arranging the flowers in a cascade to the left front. The colour in this photo is quite true, whereas in the close-up with a white background the colour is washed-out. The one small leaf going to the right at the mouth of the vase prevents that side from looking flat.


This year marks the 60th anniversary of Ikebana International Melbourne, Chapter 29. The new Iemoto of the Ichiyo School of Ikebana, Mr Naohiro Kasuya, will be the special guest at a luncheon to be held on the 28th March 2019. If you can make it to the event, follow this link to purchase tickets. I.I. Melbourne's 60th anniversary celebrations.


Greetings from Christopher
3rd January 2019