USING GOLD LEAF

We are really feeling the cold this week. This is because of the poorly-timed (winter) re-roofing of our house in Torquay. One of the necessary processes was the decommissioning of the gas heater in the living room. Fortunately, we have heating elsewhere in the house and we are able to stay warm.

A sure sign of winter in this part of the world is the start of the blossoming of the Australian Wattles, acacias. Among the early flowering wattles, I noticed this beautiful Acacia baileyana a couple of days ago in a nearby garden. It is one of the most abundantly flowering wattles that we see locally. Sadly, the large Acacia baileyana in our garden came to the end of its life a few years ago. However, it is a pleasure to see these wonderful trees in the depths of winter. 

Last week, I posted this photograph of a reworked arrangement, to which I had added some white Narcissus. In this case some jonquils, one of the many species of the Narcissus genus.

Two of my Geelong students, Maree and Jo, sent me photographs recently of some ikebana arrangements they had made using Narcissus. They had taken the opportunity to make these arrangements using flowers from Jo's garden. Above is an ikebana Jo made using white Jonquils, in which the leaves have been arranged into a triangular design. The flowers form a point of focus at the top of the arrangement.

Maree's arrangement is also made with Jonquils from Jo's garden. She arranged the naturally-curving leaves to create an asymmetrical structure around the small mass of yellow flowers.

At the beginning of the week, I attended a workshop of the Victorian Branch of the Sogetsu school. The workshop was led by one of the teachers, Akemi Suzuki, who demonstrated techniques for using artificial gold leaf and gold powder on large leaves in an ikebana arrangement. She presented this topic as she had recently attended a workshop on the theme at the Sogetsu headquarters in Tokyo.

This is my arrangement from the workshop. I had cut two philodendron leaves, one of which had started to yellow on one side. I thought it looked particularly beautiful, especially after I had cleaned it with some white oil. I decided that the yellow colour would not look good with gold added to it. So I applied three small patches of gold leaf on the smaller lower leaf. Because the two leaves had significant visual strength, not much else was required to complete the ikebana. All I added was a small piece of driftwood placed at the top of the larger ot the two vessels.

More photographs from the workshop can be viewed via this link: Gold leaf and  powder workshops.

After the workshop, I re-set the ikebana at home, altering the positioning of the vessels and bringing the driftwood to the front of the arrangement.   

Greetings from Christopher
27th July 2025

 

RE-USING MATERIALS

A couple of weeks ago I had a class with my Melbourne students for the first time since returning from holidays. Two of the students are studying Book 1 of the Sogetsu curriculum. For those of us who are teachers it is a pleasure to see the changes in the students as they start to see the botanical world anew through their "ikebana eyes". 

Julie-Ann's exercise was to make a Slanting Variation No. 1. This means that the shorter branch supporting the main line is angled away to the back. The change in position creates a larger space between those two stems.

 

Chen's exercise was to repeat the Basic Upright, Nageire style. Unfortunately we had to fossick for material at the last minute, so the principal branches are not entirely satisfactory. However, it was a good learning exercise because the branches were thick enough to practise this difficult fixing correctly.

Because it is winter, I had set the advanced students the exercise of making an ikebana with Camellias using either willow or pine as a second material.

In the absence of pine (or willow) Marisha used Cypress, another member of the Conifer family. Her freestyle arrangement has the basic structure of a Variation No 3.

In this arrangement, Jacqueline chose to use a clear glass vase. She had some left-over stems of tortuous Willow Salix, at home which she used in the arrangement. For the purpose of balancing the design she added some willow inside the vase. The Camellias are in a small tube.

Aileen was given some variegated Pine Pinaceae, with quite short stems, by an ikebana friend. She made a freestyle arrangement, adding a single "Brushfields yellow" Camellia. The vase is by the Australian ceramicist Ian Jones.

Aileen made a second ikebana in this low modern tubular ikebana vessel. The pine formed a stretched S-shaped curve from the centre of the vessel to the left side.

My own ikebana this week is an example of re-using materials. 

The structure, which I made with some Japanese Quince Chaenomeles, branches on 29th June, still looked fresh. It was just beginning to show the development of some tiny leaves, so I added a bunch of white Narcissus. I was very happy with the result as the tall straight lines harmonised well with the branches. It also made the focal point of the ikebana higher in the arrangement than in the earlier version.

Vessel by Phil Elson

Greetings from Christopher

20th July 2025

KATH DACY 1926 -2025

Today I pay tribute to my ikebana friend and colleague Kath Dacy who died last Wednesday at the age of 98. Kath was a student of the late Norman Sparnon, as were many of Australia's early ikebana community. She also was a student of the late, highly regarded, Victorian teacher Ursula Breit. 

Kath was a qualified high school art teacher before she was introduced to the art of ikebana, which became a lifelong passion for her. She served as the Deputy Director of the Victorian Branch of the Sogetsu School in 1993 and 1994, and as the Director in 1995 and 1996.

Like many of her peers, Kath was drawn to the bold, modern feeling of strength, as well as beauty, in ikebana. I cannot date this photograph but think it might be the 1980's.

I first met Kath in the early 2000's when I joined the Victorian Branch as a recently qualified Sogetsu teacher. We got to know each other over time as she occasionally spent the weekend at a holiday house nearby in Torquay.

This photo shows Kath working on her floor-based ikebana arrangement at the Victorian Branch's 50th anniversary exhibition in Federation Square 2014.

Again at the 50th anniversary exhibition preparations. 

I always enjoyed discussing ikebana with Kath. Her perspective on ikebana seemed to me to be profoundly influenced by her training and her practice as an art teacher. I feel enriched by her insights and analysis of ikebana.

Kath died at ninety eight; a long life committed to education and the enjoyment and creation of things of beauty. Although her body became frail, ikebana was always an inspiration for her.

This photo is of her Ikebana at the Sogetsu School's Victorian Branch exhibition in 2013 at the Malvern Artists' Society Gallery.

Vale Kath, and thank you. 

Christopher

12th July 2025

SMALL WINTER IKEBANA ARRANGEMENTS

As an Ikebana practitioner I have a particular appreciation of the conditions in winter where I live. The climate of the southern coastline of mainland Australia is 'Mediterranean'. That means hot dry summers and cold wet winters. It means there is still plenty of green to be seen during winter. This is particularly because Australia is blessed with native evergreen trees being the rule, rather than the exception. 

Here is an interesting example in this photograph I took in the Royal Botanical Gardens Melbourne this morning. In the foreground, deciduous trees from China and North Asia in their autumn colour, while in the background are Australian evergreen eucalyptus trees. 

To ikebana.

On Saturday, Ikebana international Melbourne Chapter held a workshop which I was unable to attend. The guest presenter's topic was 'The Way of Tea'. It reminded me of some ikebana that I had seen in 2023 when I participated in an 'Art, Architecture and History Tour' in Japan. 

The following two photos are of some ikebana I saw arranged in a traditional tokonoma, the display alcove of a traditional formal Japanese room.

This ikebana was in a National Trust of Japan property in Tokyo, built for Mr Yoshisaburo Fujita.

I photographed this small ikebana in a hanging vase in one of the houses in the Samurai district in Kanazawa.

I was prompted to make this very simple ikebana arrangement.  I have used two leaves of an unidentified ground lily (I think) and a small sprig of Brushfields yellow Camellia with an opening bud. I have discovered that I have not catalogued the vase and will have to go back to my paper records.

To make today's ikebana ...

...I gathered a single small branch of Manchurian pear Pyrus ussuriensis, from the garden of our apartment, with which I created a late-autumn, early-winter ikebana arrangement. The Manchurian pear is growing in a very sheltered position. So it still has quite a lot of green leaves, despite it being early July. I gathered the spent seedheads of some Dietes for their slightly nutty brown colour, and also the feeling of late autumn that they provide. The bottle-shaped vase is by Jamie Beeston.

Greetings from Christopher

6th June 2025