I have come at last to the end of teaching classes for 2021. On Thursday the final class for my Torquay students was held in my house. The challenge for the students was to make an ikebana in one of my vessels in a suitable location in the house with materials they had brought with them. I was interested to note that each of the students chose unusually shaped vessels for their ikebana.
Coralie had done some at home preparation and had sprayed the tops of three straight, dried stems of Agapanthus with silver paint. These she arranged in each of the full depth spaces in this difficult to use modern blue-glazed vessel. She added some bright red Nandina berries at the top of the Agapanthus and a curving branch of Cyprus across the top of the vessel.
Róża used a ceramic, "moon-shaped" vessel to arrange two leaves of New Zealand flax, a stem of small white unidentified flowers and a Christmas ribbon. She was focused on creating an elegant space between the flax leaves and allowed the flowers to cascade forward below the level of the shelf.
Judy used a single flower stem of New Zealand flax from her garden, and a small flowering branch of Grevillea robusta. She chose the modern-style ikebana vessel for its interesting shape and turquoise glaze. Her attention was also on the space between the two "S"- shaped curves in the materials.
Marta was drawn to the curve and the shino glaze in this vessel by Graeme Wilkie. She has followed the curve with a line of Spruce and has a small focal mass of creamy-white unidentified flowers, red Alstromeria, and an almost invisible large white poppy on the right. The ikebana was arranged on the sideboard with a busily carved wooden background where the poppy was clearly visible. My eyes did not see how it disappeared into the white background when I moved the work to take this photo! Sorry, Marta.
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Over the past month I have noticed that the Agapanthus plant I used last on a post back in May has again produced some flowers with fasciated stems and exceptionally large flower heads. With permission from the owner I picked three of these flowers to use in my ikebana. I was particularly interested to emphasise the curve just below the flower.
This is the first ikebana I made. I used a box shaped vase that I was able to place on its side and have set two flowers as though they are growing out and up from the opening. It was quite a challenge to secure the very heavy stems so that they arise from the vase without touching the sides. I used a small ceramic block to support the stems near the mouth of the vase and at the other end a cross-bar to hold the bottom of the stem down. The vase is by the Victorian ceramic artist Mel Ogden.
As the arrangement was very wide, I re-worked the materials adding a third flower to create an upright ikebana in this traditional ceramic suiban . At the base of the ikebana I have added some shortened Aspidistra leaves as the ikebana looked too flat on the lefthand side; they also give the work depth, both to the back and coming forward.
Greetings from Christopher
5th December 2021
I have never seen fasciated agapanthus stems before, so interesting and lovely for Ikebana. I enjoyed reading about the techniques you used to hold those two agapanthus flowers in that sideways position and I loved the finish Upright arrangement. You positioned the fasciated stems to show their lovely curves. The aspidistra leaf you chose and placed in front shows a curve and upward movement and the one in back for depth finishes the arrangement. I like the choice of the different green the aspidistra leaves give to this arrangement and keeping them short and only using two they don’t become the focal point. A really lovely arrangement.
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