FROM THE ARCHIVE

On Wednesday I attended the opening day of the Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show (MIFGS). There were many glad hearts as this major event had been cancelled in each of the last two years. This year there are a number of ikebana displays by both groups and individuals. One of them was prepared by the Melbourne Chapter of Ikebana International, which has exhibited at the MIFGS every year since 2003. The theme that was chosen by I.I. Melbourne Chapter for this year's installation was inspired by a Haiku written by the famous Japanese poet, Matsuo Basho (1644 - 1694). In translation the Haiku  reads,

"Bright red

        the pitiless sun

Autumn winds."

This photo shows the whole of the I.I. Melbourne stand taken from the elevated position of the north-side gallery above the central nave of the huge Royal Exhibition Building (built 1879-1880). This rather distant view is the only one from which all of the individual ikebana works can be clearly seen.

However, they are meant to be seen as a group of ikebana works from six different schools relating to each other through the common theme set by the Haiku and by the use of red in all arrangements. For a photographer another difficulty is the fact that, without side walls to the site, the ikebana works on the side can be lost in the background of adjacent displays. The truly important lesson is that ikebana is to be experienced live, in three dimensions, as it relates to its setting and sometimes through our sense of smell as well.

When we look at a photograph of ikebana it has become translated and the experience is of a two dimensional art work. The photographs below are like discrete, fragmented elements of a collage. We have to imagine how they create a greater whole when seen and experienced close together in lived experience.

Rachel Lok, Shogetsudo Koryu

 

Jennie Stuart, Sogetsu School

Yuko Asano, Wafu Ikebana

Felicia Huang, Ohara School

Helen Marriott, Shogetsudo Koryu

Lucy Papas, Sogetsu School

Josephine Tan, Ohara School

Angie Chau, Ikenobo School

*          *          *          *          *

On Thursday Laurie and I travelled to Shepparton in north central Victoria before travelling across the border into New South Wales. 

What then is this mass of interlocking fine yellow stems? We saw this material being blown across the road as we drove in southern New South Wales. I now know it to be the seed heads of  the "Blown Grass", Lachnagrostis filiformis, native to Australia, New Zealand and Polynesia. I have seen it before where we live...

... but never in this kind of quantity.

The blown grass was not the only eye-catching sight in Yerong Creek NSW, where we also saw the recently-painted murals on the town's water tower.

The painting of this mural is like those we had seen last year in Western Victoria on the wheat silos.

The Yerong Creek Water Tower Art is a striking mural that captures the town's past, present and future hopes.

 

Third view.

Finally, as I am travelling and have not had the opportunity to make an ikebana this week, here is an ikebana I made in January 2011 (from the Archive). 

It is made from material I gathered around the property of our  friends David and Catherine who reside in Tasmania.  The materials are an interestingly twisted dried branch and Bursaria spinosa. The vessel is by the Victorian ceramic artist Terunobu Hirata.

Greetings from Christopher

3rd April 2022