TAKING A SECOND LOOK

In response to my posting last week one of my students wrote to me saying, in part: "...I realised that I spend a lot of my time worrying about doing garden ‘chores’ instead of just enjoying the garden - especially when it is starting to enter its Spring Best!  That said -inspired by your blog - I wandered around taking photos of as many blue-tending flowers as I could..."

This comment and my own experiences of the last week led me to this post's title.

Three days after I photographed the blue iris bud included in last week's posting it suddenly opened fully. As the day was going to be warm and windy I cut it and brought it inside before it was ruined by the sudden heat. What to do with a single flower?

I arranged it within the gentle curve of two Acanthus leaves *. The leaf at the back is deliberately turned to show the veins on its underside. The blue crystalline-glazed vessel is by the Castlemaine ceramic artist Dean Smith. I was disappointed when the iris started to wilt after three days, but a little consoled to discover a smaller and paler bud opening behind the first flower

Recently, I set my Torquay students the exercise of making a single ikebana arrangement using two vessels.   

Val used two black, contemporary vessels in which she set two Strelitzia reginae leaves and one flower, with a double head. This is another example of showing the back of a leaf for the textural contrast it provides.

What a difference a week makes! Suddenly there is an extra zing in her ikebana when the flower started opening.

In spite of these delightful surprises we must not get caught up in the desire for our ikebana to last indefinitely. It is essentially an ephemeral art form and therein lies an aspect of its richness. Each ikebana arrangement is a unique encounter with those particular materials, that can never happen again in exactly the same way.

In the garden the Pandorea pandorana vine is putting on a strong spurt of spring growth and has started to flower. It seems to be especially vigorous this year, perhaps because of recent rain.

Here some of the new growth is silhouetted against the early morning sky. I cut some of the thicker old stems as well as fresh growth and flowers.

I have arranged them in a tall modern ceramic vase with two side openings. The lines of the vine created interesting spaces which I kept principally on one side and emphasised by removing most of the leaves on the newer stem. The contrasting mass of flowers has been placed on the opposite side with a single line of the fresh vine connecting the two sides.

The flowers did not last as well as I had hoped. However, as I walked past the ikebana multiple times each day I realised that I had not taken my photograph from the best angle.

A couple of days later I had to remove the wilting flowers and I added a small bunch of Dwarf Nandina Domestica for the mass that balances the lines. From this slightly different angle each group of green leaves sit in their own space without any further adjusting.

Greetings from Christopher

12th September 2020

* Acanthus leaves are a favourite of mine for the beauty of their shape, shine and deep green colour. Owing to their sticky sap they are prone to wilting very quickly. The remedy is to re-cut the stems under water and then stand in warm, deep water with 10ml of white vinegar per litre for a couple of hours.

Note to Ursula B. The Blogger system protects your privacy and I am unable to contact you. 

I would suggest that you contact the Sogetsu Queensland Branch at the following address:

https://ikebanabrisbane.org.au/