Special Event! 50th Anniversary of Sogetsu in New Zealand.

Recently I had the good fortune to be able to attend an event in Auckland which was in celebration of the 50th year of Sogetsu Ikebana in New Zealand. There was an exhibition, demonstrations by Master Ken Katayama, who was visiting from Sogetsu Headquarters in Japan and there were also two days of workshops. Overall it was a fantastic experience, I participated in the exhibition and enjoyed both days of the workshops. The venues in which the exhibition and demonstrations as well as the workshops were held were excellent and the organisation by the members of Auckland branch was very professional indeed. The whole affair was very impressive.

I’ve included some photos of the exhibition arrangements below, though not all works are shown. This is because in some details and other arrangements in the background made it challenging to show some arrangements to their best. These arrangements are by participants in the exhibition who came from all over the world. (I will show mine separately so as to avoid confusion.)

The following gallery shows a selection of some of the demonstration works by Master Ken Katayama. Again not all of the works are shown due to having visual elements or distractions in the background.

Last but not least is my work from the exhibition, which was the only miniature arrangement. I feel that being the only miniature made it stand out and engage the audience in a different way. It invited them to come close to see what it was about. My feeling is this was a good thing as it made my piece memorable.

Return to Raku

It has once again been a busy couple of weeks but amongst all the travel and work I've been doing for lessons and so on, I've been keeping things interesting at Raku Dining with two more sets of arrangements. It is such a wonderful opportunity to provide ikebana for such an esteemed restaurant although not without it's unique challenges. One needs to work quickly, and tidily, casuing minimal disruption to the restaurant but also produce interesting arrangements that capture the moment in time and the right feeling for that week. Then there is also the great challenge of photographing and recording the work for posterity and so that I can post it here. The restaurant setting is tricky as there are so many things going on in a visual sense that it is hard to keep the image of the ikebana as the principal focus in the picture. This is something that I am still working on improving and so as time goes by you'll see me try different things with the photographs to try and keep the main focus on the arrangement. Some will be more successful than others I am sure! I welcome any feedback folks may have on good approaches or improvements I might make in this regard. 

Week 2 at Raku Dining

Arrangement in the private function room - use of water and space

Arrangement near the entry - focus on mass and dynamic line creating movement and space

Arrangment at corner of kitchen bar - vertical focus

Week 2 at Raku I chose to really make a focus on a colour theme of green and pink/purple. Being the lead up into the festive season I wanted something exciting but also fresh feeling and cooling given that in Australia it's very much summer time. I used water and open space in various ways along with the colours to help the restaurant feel as inviting as possible.

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Week 3 at Raku Dining

Arrangement in Private Function Room - Use of unconventional materials (origami cranes)

Arrangement near main entrance - Use of unconventional materials to create mass (baubles and origami sonobe balls)

Arrangement at corner of kitchen bar - Use of dried or painted materials (giant fig leaf, wisteria branch & smoke bush) and unconventional materials (origami sonobe ball)

Week 3 at Raku takes us right into the Christmas festive season and all the way through to new year. This weeks arrangements required quite a bit of extra thought as they needed to not require water due to me being away in Brisbane for New Year Celebrations. With being away I would not be able to update the arrangements after only a week and so I needed to make sure they would last and feel festive even in my absence. This was tricky but fun! I really enjoyed the challenge of making these arrangments and thinking my way around bringing a festive feel but in a very Japanese way. Needless to say that my origami skills turned out to be invaluable!