FADING HYDRANGEAS

 

In my Melbourne class recently the students each had a different exercise.

Jacqueline's exercise was to make an ikebana in a suiban without using a kenzan. This is an exercise that I really enjoy because of the way that it emphasises the element of space within and around the ikebana, especially when there is a high focal point.

Jacqueline surprised me later that evening at the Ikebana International Melbourne meeting...

...where she produced this table-top 'installation' in response to the guest speaker's presentation about Saori weaving.

Eugenia's exercise was emphasising water in the arrangement. In a glass vessel she set two variegated Aspidistra leaves. One of which she split into three. The focal material is cane-stemmed Begonia.

Marcia also completed the same exercise in a glass vessel using only New Zealand flax Phormium, leaves. In spite of the fact that these ikebana works use minimal material, they are not as effortlessly easy to achieve as the photos might suggest.

Marisha's exercise was to make an ikebana to be hung on a wall. This requires the creation of a structure that will hold its shape and stay fresh looking for as long as it is required. The fresh flowers, Anthurium in this case, require a concealed source of water.

I set the students of my Torquay class the challenge of making an ikebana using two vessels.

Coralie used Dieties grandiflora leaves to create height and  forward movement in the design. I have not remembered the name of the second material. Coralie was justifiably proud of the taller vessel which she had made herself.

 

Judy created a flowing design with flax leaves, and she used pink Geraniums to create a focal point. The glass vase at the back harmonises well with the cylinder at the front of the work.

Marta used two large gracefully-curving branches of Spruce Picea, that extend to the rear and forward. The focal points are two different pink flowers, also unidentified.

In the garden the heat of recent weeks has dried the Hydrangeas considerably. Most of them now are bleached to varying degrees depending on how much direct sun they get.

 

This bush is less exposed than its neighbour. As this photo shows the tips of the leaves have also coloured to a quite intense red because of the heat stress. I wanted to use this material before they were too faded.

Because of their strong reds and pinks, I decided to use this mid-century Japanese ceramic ikebana vessel to set them off against the turquoise glaze. The vessel has two openings which enabled me to create a distinct space in the middle of the ikebana.

After a few days, the bright pink flower-head wilted and I decided to re-set the remaining materials in a different vase.

While I was working on the ikebana I took this side-view to show the forward extension of the principal line.

Then I brought the two remaining flower heads together to make a single mass. Looking from this angle the four leaves at the end of the line were too dominant. This was especially because the line came forward, making it look much larger because of the camera's foreshortening effect. To correct the balance of the ikebana I removed almost all of the leaves on the line, preserving only the one that pointed back toward the heart of the ikebana. The vase is by the Victorian ceramic artist Barry Singleton.

Greetings from Christopher

26th February 2023

INTERTWINING MATERIALS (loosely woven)

Last Sunday was bright and sunny with an afternoon cool change and a moderately strong wind. The early warmth brought a couple of different visitors to the garden.

The first of these was one of my favourite Australian native birds, the Yellow-tailed black cockatoo. They have visited the garden a few times in recent weeks, always in a group of two to seven birds at a time. We have often seen and heard them from time to time in the large Pinus radiata of a nearby house. However, this summer is the first time they have come into our garden. They have enjoyed feasting on the fruit of the two Coastal Banksias, which are now about 6 metres tall. These cockatoos have a delightfully weird call which I think has been accurately described as sounding like a cork being withdrawn from a wine bottle.

The other visitor was our old friend Spike. Here is the demonstration that Echidnas have very poor eyesight! Earlier in the day we had spotted Spike in the back garden near the clothes line. After watching him foraging for a while we went back to our domestic activities. A little while later I noticed Spike had come onto the terrace. So I told Laurie, who came outside to watch. Echidnas are very timid and will freeze or start burrowing into the ground if they suspect other large creatures are about. Laurie is standing stock still in the right side of the photo while Spike stealthily approaches. I think being down-wind prevented Spike from smelling humans.

The reward for keeping very still and quiet is a close encounter of the Echidna kind!

*          *          *         *          *

At a recent class in Geelong I set the senior students the exercise of making a summer Mazezashi, an ikebana arrangement using a variety of materials. I enjoy doing this exercise with grasses gathered from the creek near our house. 

Tess used materials from her own garden, which is clearly flourishing. There is a variety of colour and texture that has been harmonised well.

Maureen's Mazezashi is more tonal with just two contrasting colour highlights. The unusual Japanese vessel features a flat upper surface with two deep red lines on the righthand side.

Helen's ikebana has a more grassy look, having more lines than mass. Unfortunately the  longest lines of dried New Zealand Flax flower stems are lost against the black background.

Ellie arranged finer materials with rusty red and yellow being the colour focal points. The light spreading forms of the Kangaroo Paw and Fennel remind us of summer.

Maree's exercise was to make a surface by massing lines. However, using stems of sedge in a small vase with three openings made this extremely difficult. Ikebanists learn that they have to work with their materials, not against them. I suggested that it would be less frustrating to move to the next curriculum exercise, "Intertwining materials". This was a more successful outcome.

"Intertwining materials" is an exercise that was first introduced into the Sogetsu curriculum in the revision of 2008. The photograph above shows Mr Katayama's demonstration of the exercise at the workshops he gave in Melbourne to introduce the revised curriculum.

At last Monday's evening meeting of Ikebana International Melbourne the guest speaker was Prue Simmons, a teacher and practitioner of the Japanese Saori weaving technique. Saori weaving uses an easily mastered simple loom. Once they are confident, students are encouraged to weave without preconceptions, rules or expectations. The result is a gloriously rich freeform patterned cloth.

The image above is sourced from a British Saori weaving website  "The Curious Weaver". 

There is a connection here. Above is my loosely intertwined ikebana that I hastily made at the Melbourne Ikebana International meeting where Prue Simmons was the guest speaker. As is our usual practice, members were encouraged to create ikebana inspired by the theme of the guest speaker's presentation. The mass of New Zealand Flax is loosely intertwined and combined with long stems of

Cane Begonia, a hybrid of B. aconitifolia and B. coccinea.

Here is a link to the posting of last Monday's meeting of Ikebana International, Melbourne Chapter.

Greetings from Christopher 

19th February 2023

 

DOUBLE SHIN

At the Victorian Branch of the Sogetsu School meeting last Monday, a workshop was held on the theme of a Double Shin arrangement. It was led by Aileen Duke, one of the teachers of the Branch. As Aileen pointed out in her introduction: "The double shin style is not presented in the Sogetsu textbook curriculum, but  Sogetsu practitioners, including Sofu, have explored the relationships and tension made possible by using two shins in one arrangement". The workshop began with a discussion to tease out and share members' knowledge of the history and characteristics of this arrangement. 

The shin line is the longest line in a traditional ikebana arrangement and is important in creating the overall character of the work. The Double Shin idea divides the work into two discrete parts. The example above of a Double Shin Rikka is from the book, Rikka: The Soul of Japanese Flower Arrangement by Fujiwara, Y. (translated by Norman Sparnon) Reed Ltd 1976, Page 75. There is a lengthy description of the style in the book. Characteristics that I find interesting are that the two shins are made from different materials, traditionally Pine and Bamboo. The space between them is narrow and clearly defined. Also, each side of this work is a complete Rikka comprised of the nine lines that are required in this form of Ikebana.

I have always thought of this example, by Sofu Teshigahara, to be a modern interpretation of the Double Shin concept. An ikebana with the materials divided into two parts.  It was called "Kyozo II" and created in 1951.

In Norman Sparnon's book, A Guide to Japanese Flower Arrangement (Reed Ltd 1969, Page 46) there are four examples of modern Double Shin ikebana arrangements. They are all created in a vessel and of a domestic scale. In this example the two Shin lines are crossed, manipulating and changing the character of the space between them. Of the four examples illustrated this is the only one material ikebana.

A further, and very different, example is to be found in Sparnon's Creative Japanese Flower Arrangement (Shufunotomo Ltd 1982, Page 79). This seems to me to be really pushing the boundaries, having minimal material, of only one kind, and the vessel being the strongest element.

My arrangement above, is of the Sogetsu School basic curriculum variation in which the hikae, the flower element, is separated from the branch materials and placed on a separate kenzan. I have heard the space between the kenzans described as the "fish path" and wonder whether it is a style common to other schools of ikebana.

In the most recent revision of the curriculum, the Sogetsu School introduced a new style (kabuwake) in which two or more kenzans are used. However, branch and flower materials are not separated on to different kenzans. In my ikebana above attention is paid to the space between the groups and the harmony of the materials.

This is my ikebana from the workshop last Monday. I have used Bull Rushes Typha orientalis for the two Shin lines and Dockweed Rumex, for the jushi which is a rich pink because it is going to seed. In this case more jushi is placed on the left side to emphasise that Shin more than the Shin on the right-hand side. Doing so helps makes this ikebana asymmetrical.

However !   In the workshop I learnt that a Double Shin ikebana, as practiced in the Sogetsu School, uses only one kenzan and should be set in a high-sided vessel rather than a suiban. Therefore this is actually a kabuwake (separate groups) ikebana. (Never too old to learn!).

This ikebana, which I made about nine years ago, is a better example of the Double Shin ikebana. The righthand side is made stronger and given a focal point by the addition of a Pincushion Protea Leucospermum, which also makes the ikebana asymmetric.

It is interesting to see that the antecedents of the Double Shin as now practised go back to the Rikka style which was developed in the late 1500s; and that the idea of a Divided ikebana has evolved over that period up to the present time. Ikebana is clearly a living art form.

This link will take you to the posting on the Sogetsu School, Victorian Branch, website of the Workshop led by Aileen Duke.

Greetings from Christopher
12th February 2023

(SOME) MEMORIES OF SUMMER

 

February marks the beginning of the academic year in Australia. The summer holidays are over and life resumes a more familiar and structured pattern which, for me, includes teaching ikebana classes. For the first classes of this year I gave some of my students the task of making an ikebana to the topic, “memories of summer”. I enjoy setting such topics from time to time. They are neither a technical exercise nor prescriptive, so they mean that the student is free to interpret. Thus the student has to think about their own individual response to, and their interpretation of, the meaning of the words.

In my Torquay class...

...Marta set two plants with distinctive summer characteristics. On the left a branch with winged seeds from a Sycamore, Acer pseudoplatanus and on the right a branch of a Golden Rain Tree, Koelreuteria paniculata. This has both newly formed seed pods and tiny yellow flowers occurring at the same time.  

Coralie set two different stems of inflorescences that were in their seed-forming stage. On the right is Dock and on the left Giant Honey Flower Melianthus major. The leaf is also from the Giant Honey Flower. 

The Melianthus seed pods had a subtle pink colouring which I found particularly beautiful.

Judy arranged a collection of five pink-toned flowers in the Maze-zashi style in a suiban, including Hollyhock and Geranium. 

The Maze-zashi ikebana derives from the 'seven grasses/flowers of autumn' and are associated with the Rinpa school of painting. In my Melbourne class two of the students also did this exercise.

 Marcia arranged her seven tonally-related materials, which gave a dry summery feeling to her work.

Eugenia's Maze-zashi included seven materials ranging from bright flowers to seeding grasses and an unusual Canna lily with dark variegated leaves.

In my Melbourne class two of the students had other exercises. 

Marisha had the task of making an ikebana that “took into account where it was to be placed". In an earlier version of the Sogetsu curriculum this exercise was described as "incorporating the area around (beside) the vessel". She has used a palm leaf, Golden Rod Solidago altissima, and a yellow Oriental lily.  

Jacqueline had the exercise of making an ikebana arrangement to be hung on a wall. She made a framework with dried corky Elm and added Camellia branches with most of the leaves removed. A small dusty-pink focus was made with some umbelliferous plant, possibly Ajwain Trachyspermum ammi.

This week I was invited to pick some Agapanthus, that had gone to seed, from a friend's garden. The stems had long sinuous S-shaped curves that looked very beautiful.

I was also interested to notice some dark colouring on the seeds that, at a distance, looked bluish. This prompted me to find some blue flowers to go with the stems.

When I was experimenting with the possibilities of these two lines, I was delighted with the form of the space between them when they were in the position above. The irregular space had a feeling of an Art Nouveau shape; which is really not surprising given the particular lines. I have set them into a mid-century Japanese ikebana vessel so that they arise from the opening without touching the sides. I then added a column of Plumbago, Plumbago auriculata, flowers on one side so that the space remains open. I think the placement of the flowers also allows the lines to remain the main feature of the ikebana.

Greetings from Christopher

5th February 2023