Chop and Change

Does Your Bonsai Tell a Story?

Part of the lure of bonsai is that you can communicate through your trees.  You buy or grow a tree, study it for a while and decide what story you want it to tell.  This thought helps you know what to cut, what to keep, and what to bend.

I have a bunch of little junipers that weren't that interesting really.  I bought them a few years ago and wired them at about that time and just left them for another day.  Today was the day to make them tell more of a story.

We will start with this guy.  I wanted some more movement in this tree.  It was a touch boring for such a small tree.  I wanted the viewer to imagine that the left side of the tree was damaged in a storm by crushing wind.  After I decided that will be this tree's story I went ahead and jinned the left branch.  The added bonus of doing this is that now my vision is not torn left and right at the same time (the two lower branches looked like a continuous line), sending a confusing message.  

The flow of the tree now moves left and then right.  It is simpler and easier to look at.

 The second tree I worked on today had a few things going on.  The left side had a thickish branch going straight up.  I thought it was too tick to bend so decided to make this tree taller.  I wired the turning branch, that was at a 90 degree angle, up.

This tree had some enough branches to do something with.  I wanted branches right, left, and back.  I also wanted to keep some smaller ones for the apex.

I decided to chop off most of the branch that was originally coming straight up and turned it into some dead wood.  The story of this tree?  Some bear came along and sharpened his claws of the lower left branch, killing it.  He now uses it as a back scratcher from time to time.

Have fun creating stories with your bonsai.  Make them realistic and use nature as your guide.