SOGETSU EXHIBITION

 

Hello all,

It's been quite a busy couple of weeks, ikebana wise but I'm not complaining. There's nothing I enjoy more than creating ikebana.

As I had mentioned in my previous post, the Victorian Sogetsu group had its annual exhibition at the Abbotsford Convent last weekend. The arrangement, above, was my exhibit. I secured two wooden hoops in a heavy, ceramic container with a split down the middle. The branch is a dogwood, 'Cornus Norman Haddon'. It is just beginning to flower, so the flowers are still small but quite charming the way they sit up above the branch. Another charming feature of this plant is that the flowers start off creamy in colour but become pink as they age, so that at any time, there can be both pink and cream coloured flowers.

Below is Vicky's very simple but striking exhibit. She used the soft, central piece from an agave plant and some papyrus in a ceramic container.

Cymbie's arrangement, below, began with the making of the container. She Used a stripey bamboo cane and, with a weaving method, attached dietes leaves hanging down. The yellow heliconia was the focal point.

On Saturday, coinciding with our exhibition, a workshop had been organized and was presented by Master Instructor Ms Reito Oizumi, the theme for which was 'Working With Washi Paper'. Oizumi-san demonstrated ways that the washi paper can be treated, including scrunching, pleating, stripping etc. Below is the arrangement that she demonstrated using pleated washi paper, twisted willow and strelitzias reginae - flowers and leaves.

Below is my arrangement on the theme. I used stems of Siberian dogwood, Cornus Siberica alba', which I trimmed back leaving five 'V' shaped stems. I attached another stem on the top of each 'V' creating triangles. To those triangles I pasted pieces of the washi paper from the back, so that the stem framed the triangle at the front. I then placed the structure, in a forward slant, into a container with two openings. The Siberian iris completed the arrangement.

Side view showing the forward slant

The previous Tuesday was the scheduled Ikebana International workshop, for which I was the presenter. (I told you it's been a busy couple of weeks!) The theme for the workshop was 'Geometry in Ikebana'. This theme had been selected by Lucy. I was supposed to present another workshop in October and Lucy in November. But, due to surgical procedures for both of us, we swapped.

We use geometry in ikebana all the time by making shapes in lessons such as 'Repeating similar Shapes and Forms' or 'Paying attention to the Shape of the Container' but we don't call it geometry as such.

I had set up one arrangement before the meeting and demonstrated another three. Below is the first of these. It comprised of two fish bowls representing the geometric shape of a globe and two large gymea leaves, in and out of the container creating triangles. The brightly coloured, red hippeastrum flowers were donated by my sister-in-law, Betty.

In the next arrangement I started with the two conical, metal containers and added two yellow strelitzias, 'Strelitzia Mandela's Gold'. I placed them in such a way as to create a diamond shape with the flower heads.

The lacquered red container in  the next arrangement was a gift from my sister, Lucy. She brought it back from Vietnam. It has an asymmetrical, geometric shape on its own. Then, I cut two monstera deliciosa leaves into triangles and placed them in the container using a kenzan. I added red, Altissimo roses and white alstroemeria flowers to be seen through the 'window' of the leaves.

For my final arrangement, I had brought along a cube shaped structure made with bamboo and secured it into a square shaped, ceramic container. I added a stem of Oriental lilies in the space created by the cube and a small mass of alstroemeria psittacina leaves at the base.

I leave you with a wall arrangement I made just for me, using smoke bush - cotinus Grace, and strelitzias reginae.

Bye for now,

Emily