The Art of Bonsai Project

Feature Gallery

Halloween 2006

One of the most wonderful things about the art of bonsai is that, like other art forms, it can express certain moods, feelings, or impressions to the viewer. Sometimes they can suggest a darker side, a side only glimpsed occasionally on those dark chilly nights around the time called Halloween.

The bonsai in this gallery are reminiscent of the trees in such classics as Sleepy Hollow, The Wizard of OZ, The Lord of the Rings, and other literary works. Such trees that suggest darker things, that seem malevolent, that suggest being somehow alive in impossibly human manner are also present in the visual arts.

In the season of Halloween when myth turns to reality and the darkness that lies buried beneath our ordinary existence struggles to the surface, things can become more than what they were once perceived to be. Sometimes they sneak up into reality to take a bite of sanity from the unwary bonsaist, and sometimes, bonsai that were grown deep within forbidden gardens, tucked away from the sight of mere mortals, make their way into our world from those deep and foreboding gardens cultivated in the Twilight Zone.

Happy Halloween from all of us at the Art of Bonsai project!

Walter Pall - Germany
European Spruce (Picea abies)
60 cm
Pot: Chinese
Collected in Austria

Ulf Soltau - Germany
Ficus Benjimin (Ficus benjamini)
40 cm
Aquarium: aquascout

Andreas - Switzerland

Ulf Soltau - Germany
Arizona Cactus
10 cm

Candy J. Shirey - USA
Originally styled by Nick Lenz
Morrow's Honeysuckle (Lonicera morrowi)
28"
Pot: Nick Lenz

Candy J. Shirey - USA
Originally styled by Nick Lenz
Royal Azalea (Rhododendron schlippenbachii)
28"
Pot: Nick Lenz

Wolfgang Putz - Austria
Sempervivum Hybr.
Pot: Dan Barton

Wolfgang Putz - Austria
Sempervivum 'Hey Hey'
Pot: Dan Barton

Walter Pall - Germany
European Spruce (Picea abies)

Candy J. Shirey - USA
Originally styled by Nick Lenz
Alien Egg
Pinus mugo
28 inches in length x 18 inches wide x 16 inches high.
Pot: 10 inches in diameter