The Challenge

After reviewing the slide images of Arboretum bonsai, Mr. Yoshimura announced it was time to eat. He told me in advance of the visit that I shouldn't worry about food while I was there because he would cook for us. Mr. Yoshimura was a man of many talents so it did not surprise me that he might be something of a chef, as well. He got up from the table where we were seated and ambled into the nearby kitchen, opened the refrigerator, then opened the door to a freezer compartment in the upper section of the old rumbling appliance. He emerged with two "Hungry-Man" frozen TV dinners. While Mr. Yoshimura put these in the oven, he asked if I wanted something to drink. He offered me two options: water or beer. When I indicated I would have the beer, he told me to get it out of the refrigerator and get one for him, too. I went to the refrigerator, opened it and saw it was empty except for one sad-looking bunch of celery and about thirty bottles of beer. The beer was Budweiser, and it was all in stubby, seven-ounce brown glass bottles. For several years in my sketchy young adulthood I drove a truck for a Budweiser distributorship, so I knew their product line pretty well. I had never before seen these bonsai-sized bottles, and I've never come across them since!

We stayed up late that night, drinking from little bottles of beer and talking. The next day I awoke fairly early, considering the hour I had gone to sleep, but Mr. Yoshimura was already up and about. He had removed the slide projector from the dining room table and replaced it with numerous other items. There were bonsai tools, rolls of both copper and aluminum wire, a large round turntable, what appeared to be a miniature artificial Christmas tree and several books opened to particular pages, stacked in a pile. Mr. Yoshimura had set up a classroom and the materials on the table were all part of his lesson plan for the day. The old teacher had prepared for me like he had prepared for countless students over the years. Whether he taught them in groups or individually, in classrooms, club meeting halls or at his home, Mr. Yoshimura dedicated most of his life to passing along bonsai knowledge to his students. He approached teaching in a methodical way. He was a precise man who prided himself on preparing thoroughly for his professional activities, and Mr. Yoshimura had a plan for my bonsai education.

Mr. Yoshimura's teaching style was direct. He spoke declaratively and took pains to be exact in his statements. He expressed himself with authority that arose from an absolute command of his subject, acquired over an entire lifetime spent immersed in the art of miniature trees and landscapes. Much of what Mr. Yoshimura covered that day and the next was fundamental information — the basic, rudimentary stuff of bonsai. He put me through the paces. The little artificial evergreen tree was a teaching tool, its many limbs all bendable and removable, allowing for a multitude of different possible stylistic designs. I had brought along a baldcypress bonsai from the Arboretum's collection, and this was the focus of considerable attention on the second day of study. Mr. Yoshimura used this tree as the subject for a lesson first in classical bonsai design theory and then in the basics of wiring. He had me wire all the branches on the tree then critiqued the job I did before telling me to remove all the wire and do it again. He showed me how to strap a bamboo rod to the trunk of the tree and then use a guy wire to pull the top of the tree toward the rod so that a very short, stout section of the trunk line was moved into a better position. Mr. Yoshimura directed me to do multiple mechanical bonsai tasks while he observed, instructing how to do them properly. And constantly he referred to printed materials — books, magazines, and educational handouts he had generated himself for teaching purposes — in order to make his point. He would argue the case in support of his styling ideas and dismiss tree designs he didn't like as being "not logical."

One exercise that left a lasting impression on me involved a sort of cross-training. We reviewed a collection of images Mr. Yoshimura had gathered together in a folder, consisting of photographs and reproductions of drawings and paintings from an array of different sources. The subjects depicted in these images were completely varied and not pertaining to bonsai in any obvious way. Mr. Yoshimura would hold up an image and tell me what visually attracted him to it. Primarily he was concerned with matters of composition, which is why the subject depicted was not of much importance. One particular image he showed was clipped from a magazine. It was a full page, full color advertisement for ladies plus-size lingerie, featuring three young, plus-sized women lolling about in their undergarments. Mr. Yoshimura noted the placement of the three figures, the poses they were in, the ways they related to each other. He discussed the spaces between them and spoke about the way the viewer's eye moved from one figure to the next. Mr. Yoshimura thought the composition of the photograph was good. He was about to move on to another image when he paused to hold the lingerie ad before him another second. "Huh," he said, "the women aren't bad, either!" 

The exercise was effective because it stimulated my aesthetic interest by making a connection between bonsai and other forms of visual art. He was speaking to my knowledge of art, showing me that what I already knew about compositional arrangement for the purpose of visual effect was very much applicable to what I was now trying to learn. In this and other ways he helped crystalize in my mind the reality of bonsai as an artistic medium.

Catering to my aesthetic sensibilities was one way Mr. Yoshimura personalized my instruction. Another involved his keen interest in my responsibilities as caretaker of a public bonsai collection. The authority of my position was a theme he emphasized and returned to repeatedly, always with the exhortation that I should strive to engage the public and bring more people into bonsai appreciation. Mr. Yoshimura's world revolved around bonsai. He recognized the potential impact of public collections and the power they have to inspire, to reach more people over the long haul than any bonsai show or organization could possibly reach. Not only did he appreciate public collections as important in that regard, he saw the position of curator as being potentially of tremendous influence. He made it personal, too: YOU have to work to build the bonsai program at your arboretum. YOU have to reach out to people in the bonsai community and get them involved in what you are doing. YOU have to cultivate a dynamic stage presence so you can speak to many different groups of people and capture their attention. YOU have to develop some new concept of bonsai display so your collection will stand out from all others. YOU have to think differently. YOU have to make something of this opportunity that is presented to you.

When I was imagining beforehand what my study time with Mr. Yoshimura might be like, my best hope was to be on the receiving end of a massive transfusion of bonsai information. That happened to the extent it could in the span of three days. The problem is that three days of bonsai study, regardless of the intensity of it and whom the teacher might be, adds up to nothing more than a drop in the comprehensive ocean of what there is to learn. I didn't know that so well at the time, but Mr. Yoshimura surely did. He exerted himself in an effort to teach me everything he could in the time we had. His mind was simultaneously working on a different level, though, looking beyond the limitations of where I was in my bonsai understanding. He was seeing the future, or at least envisioning a future that might come to be. In bonsai, this is standard behavior. When you begin shaping a bonsai from the earliest stages you take stock of the raw material before you, then try to imagine outcomes based on what there is to work with and what you can reasonably expect will happen over time. You make decisions about what to do with the material based on that idea of future possibilities. By those actions you begin to steer the material that way. Maybe one day what you envision comes to be, or perhaps it goes otherwise — only time will tell.

One term for this sort of anticipation of the future is visualization. It is an ability that some people have to a greater degree than others, and Mr. Yoshimura had it more than most. His ability to visualize not only made it possible for him to be an outstanding designer of little trees, it enabled him to see the value of teaching bonsai to the foreigners wielding influence in Japan following World War II. It was what prompted him to make the incredibly bold move of setting up shop in the United States in 1959. It was at work again when he suggested to Dr. Creech in 1972 that having a national bonsai collection would be worthwhile.

Mr. Yoshimura may have known exactly what he was doing with me, as I think he did, but it did not seem sensible at the time. I was there with the expressed desire to learn how to be a bonsai artist. That was daunting enough! All his focus on my curatorial responsibilities and what I should do to build a comprehensive bonsai program at the Arboretum and establish it on a national or even international basis seemed to be at least premature, if not totally out of touch with reality. Or maybe he was pulling my leg. I had quickly come to discover that Mr. Yoshimura had a sly sense of humor. For all his seeming severity, he could be surprisingly mischievous. Sometimes he would say something straight-faced only later to let on he was kidding. Perhaps that was what he was doing with all the talk about the big things I should do in my position as caretaker of the Arboretum's little start-up collection, and I had better be careful not to embarrass myself.

We were sitting around that same dining room table where so much of my time with Mr. Yoshimura was spent. We were talking — easily, earnestly, expansively — as we did the whole while I was there with him. Mr. Yoshimura was once again encouraging me to do great things, giving all kinds of advice, trying to make me see what he was seeing. "You must dream big," he said. "You must create the Carolina school of bonsai."

Wait — what? The Carolina school of bonsai?

That was enough for me. Now he had to be putting me on, stringing me along to see how far I'd follow. I laughed at what he said. Mr. Yoshimura practically jumped out of his chair, suddenly leaning in and pointing emphatically at me. "NO JOKE!" he said, his voice as loud and sharp as ever I heard it. "It is your responsibility!"

We sat there for a moment looking at each other. His expression was stern, the very image of the imperious old master I had fretted about meeting. I was baffled but certain now he meant what he was saying. I quietly accepted his challenge, although I had no clue as to how I would meet it.