Now at Raku Dining!

It's been a little while since my last blog post but there have been a few things bubbling away that I was waiting to share with you. One of these is that HanaKuma Ikebana is now providing Ikebana arrangments to Raku Dining in Canberra's cerntral business district of Civic. Raku is a top class Japanese restaurant serving some of the most excellent traditional favourites and modern interpretations of the finest Japanese cuisine in a stunningly decorated environment where you can enjoy your meal whilst watching the master chefs at work! You can now also enjoy taking in a view of some of my own lovely arrangements as you enjoy your meal. I must say I pass my most heartfelt thanks to Raku for this wonderful opportunity to show my work in such a wonderful environment. See below for a visual treat to go with your culinary feast!

If you'd like to check out what delicious foods that Raku Dining has on offer or you'd like to make a booking please click on the link below to visit their page. 

http://rakudining.com.au/

Demonstration time!

Between Family visits and trips to Sydney I was asked by the organisers of the Spring Out Festival (Canberra's LGBTIQ+ Pride festival) to do a demonstration of ikebana at the judging of the "Bake off". The idea was to keep the people who had entered the baking competition and any of their friends engaged and interested whilst the Judges were making their decisions on the winning entries. Of course I saw this as a wonderful opportunity to bring ikebana to a new and different audience of people that may not have encountered it before! It was also very exciting as it was only my second time demonstrating and my first with no other teacher there to assist me in what I was doing! Needless to say I was a little nervous, however things went very well. I did manage to take some video which is in two parts.

Sadly the part 2 video cuts out a couple of minutes before the end but it does show most of what I was doing. The location was in a cafe so I appologise in advance for the background noise and people sometimes moving about. 

Part 2 follows below.

Seminars and workshops and classes oh my! (part 2)

Following the amazing and inspirational weekend of Seminars and workshops it was time to knuckle down and get back to class and keep my learning on track. The first lesson was about arranging with fruiting material. Having been in Sydney for several days I had not been able to bring appropriate material for this class with me from Canberra. So I asked the always charming Kevin Wallpole if he happened to have anything fruitbearing in his garden that I might use for the purpose of the class and he very kindly obliged me with something truly amazing! GIANT FIG! Oh my goodness what a challenge! In a moment of clarity I realised exactly what I needed to do and once I got to class I set about my goal with determination. See the result below.

I must apologise for the poor image quality, as it was taken on my phone I had to do quite a lot of doctoring to the photograph to best show the arrangement. 

As you can see the leaves are massive and a tremendous feature in themselves with the fruit sitting tightly into the space where the leaf meets the main stem of the plant. This posed some significant challenges. I didn't want to damage the fruit or knock it off so I had to trim the leaves leaving quite a bit of stem. Usually this is unsightly and not particularly desirable but I decided that I would cover the exposed cuts with gold leaf to indicate the very special and unusual nature of this material. This was very eye catching and interesting and worked to enhance the arrangement overall so was a good way of solving a tricky problem. I was pleased to still show a leaf in a way that supported and presented the fruit with the growing tips of the plant making for another strongly linear and dynamic element. Overall both my teacher and I were very happy with the result. 

The next exercise was in simplification... talk about changing gear in my brain! I chose to work with some kangaroo paw that I had found in a local florist. I felt this was a very interesting material because it really has a number of qualities that can be shown off to great effect. The idea of the exercise is to minimise the use of the material whilst not losing or hiding its essential nature. It's like the ultimate exercise in editing. See the result below.

Again my apologies for the poor image quality. 

I had enough time in class for one final exercise which was about deconstructing and then reconstructing material... I set myself the challenge of again working with kangaroo paw and just a small bit of pincushion grevillea (instead of using a kenzan). I took the entire idea of Kangaroo Paw to pieces and re-invented it completely. Typically a dry climate plant I decided to do an arrangment submerged in water. Also, the flowers usually appear sparsely at the margins of the stems so I massed and concentrated them as certralised elements with stems forming a laticework around.. it's like I took the very idea of a kangaroo paw and turned it inside out. See the result below.

Seminars and workshops and classes oh my! (part 1)

Most recently I was very fortunate to attend a weekend seminar and accompanying workshop in Sydney given by esteemed visiting Sogetsu Master Ms Misei Ishikawa. This was such a pleasure to attend and I feel that I learned a great deal from the experience. The intention of the seminar was to properly introduce Sogetsu Ikebana practitioners to the new Book 5 Textbook. It will soon be the case that if a teacher has not attended this or a similar workshop, their teaching will not be recognised officially by the school headquarters in Japan. So naturally it was very important to attend! The aim was to unify some specific skills among teachers to ensure that they could give their students the best possible learning experience in the future.

On the first morning there was a video lecture from the Iemoto of the school Ms Akane Teshigahara which was very inspirational as well as talks from Master Ishikawa about every lesson in the entire Book 5 Textbook. To say it was thorough is an understatement! In the afternoon session there was another video lecture from the Iemoto followed by practical demonstrations by the master which was again very inspiring! An informal dinner at a local restaurant followed. 

The next day was a day of workshops where we were able to show off our own practical skills for the Master and receive some valuable feedback. In part one we were asked to assemble a free standing structure from some provided branch material. We could assemble using wire, nails, screws etc but the fixings that we used had to not be obviously visible. A fun challenge to be sure but one that I was able to meet. Part Two required us to add a container and turn the branches in to a different position than was initially used and to then create a completed arrangment adding foliage and plant material. The results around the room were so massively varied it was a wonderful demonstration of the different things that could be done using these few techniques. Here is a photograph of what I was able to achieve.

Master Ishikawa paid me a great compliment in saying the arrangement captured the spirit of "Ikebana becomes me" which is a fundamental ideal of the school in terms of Sogetsu Ikebana reflecting the very nature of the artist that makes it, and that it was "very impressive" meaning that the arrangement showed a lot of my own self in its boldness and strength.

In the afternoon session we were asked to create a celebratory arrangement using as much of the same material as we liked but also having a mandatory components of some camelia leaves and the addition of mizuhikki (Japanese paper string). I decided that I would celebrate something close to my heart and commemorate the results of the recent plebicite on marriage equality which had resulted in the national population voting yes to marriage equality for LGBTIQ+ people.  

For me there was so much meaning in the arrangement. The heavy branch representing a great obstacle being overcome, the lower swirls of mizuhikki representing the seemingly endless cycles of debate on the issue, the red bougainvillea for the passion of the people and the cost to many of that struggle for equality and finally rising above, the camelia leaves as a symbol of victory, new growth and renewal, also incorporating mizuhikki loosely representing two samurai interlinked. As I explained my thinking and the symbolism the room went quiet and at the end I received a round of applause... I think everyone was very moved and this will be a memory I will treasure for the rest of my life. While Master Ishikawa was a little uncertain around the subject matter of the arrangement as I talked about the meaning her appreciation grew and grew and I could tell she appreciated the thoughtfullness that had gone into what I had done. Not only was it aesthetically pleasing but very very meaningful. In the end she was very approving of the arrangement. That wraps up the seminars and workshops part, classes will be covered in part 2! 

Busy Busy Busy! So much happening...

The last few weeks have been jam packed with so much activitiy I can hardly think of where to start!. There had been visits from family and demonstrations given as well as trips to Sydney for seminars and workshops as well as the regular attendance in class to continue my own leaning and ikebana journey. And to make things a little more crazy I've also been struggling with a bit of a chest infection. So you can see the title of this blog entry is very apt.

Lets start by looking back a little, with the family visiting I wanted to produce a nice and interesting arrangement in the front entry hall. One of the visiting family members was coming all the way from Romania and so I wanted this arrangement to be very uniquely Australian. I made use of dried materials including banksia, eucalyptus branches and native seed pods to create the arrangement you see below. Challenging, interesting and very unusual (I thought). I hope you like it. 

I made a couple of other arrangements to place around the house to make everyone feel welcome. 

After everyone had had an enjoyable stay and bid us farewell it was time for a brief rest before heading off to Sydney for a seminar and workshop by a visiting Master from Japan! (more about that in the next plog post).

The learning sensei

Thursday marked the return to classes for me. Even as I prepare to teach in 2018, I am myself continuing on my own learning journey. Thursday was especially productive and exciting as I took two classes with the always awesome Sogetsu Ikebana teacher, Sandra Marker in Sydney at her home studio. We covered working with 5 or more materials which can be quite the challenge to manage all the different kinds of plants without it starting to look a bit like a disorganised shopping list!!! Very tricky indeed. In the end I achieved a great arrangement that harmonised well, the materials being complimentary to each other and creating a beautiful soft mass with nodding fresias and xanthorea adding height and movement. 

lesson 4.5 - working with 5 or more materials

During the remaining time in the mornings class I created a freestyle arrangement making use of a wonderfully interesting dried branch from a weeping mulberry.

Freestyle arrangement using weeping mulberry branch

After a break for lunch I was up for the next challenge! The afternoon lesson was about working with vines - a very tricky material indeed. The main idea was to show the key feature of the vine. In the case of the native hardenbergia that I was using, I wanted to show its twisting and twining nature. I set about achieving my goal using two containers to help support the vine off the working surface and to provide lots of structure for the vine to entwine. The lesson was a success and we arranged the final piece in several configurations, exploring having a black vase to the front and also one with a white vase to the front and alternating the surface between black and white as well. As the final challenge for the day my teacher asked me to try the exercise using only a single container that she selected and to create somthing with a slightly more horizontal feel. While I was very happy with the results I achieved along the way I think that it was the final exercise that I found to be the most satisfying. I achieved a truly arresting arrangement that both my teacher and I were very pleased with. 

Blog coming soon!

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