Leading Bonsai club in the nation to celebrate its 50th anniversary
Cultural News, May 2007
Members of the California Bonsai Society at its annual spring show in the Huntington Library in San Marino, Calif. (Cultural News Photo)
By Takeshi Nakayama
Bonsai, the Japanese art of creating miniature trees, has reached a high
level of popularity in the United States due to the efforts of its enthusiasts. The California Bonsai Society, the leading club in the nation, holds its 50th Anniversary Convention and Show on Thursday, May 31, through Sunday, June 3, at the Crowne Plaza Resort Anaheim hotel in Garden Grove.
The convention features guest experts from Japan: Hiroshi Takeyama, chairman of the Nippon Bonsai Association who will lead a workshop, and Hirotoshi Saito, internationally-renown teacher and lecturer.
Event chairman Lindsay Shiba, president of the California Bonsai Society, expects between 250-300 people at the convention, including hobbyists from various parts of the United States and numerous bonsai enthusiasts from Mexico, Europe and Japan.
“This is going to be one of the bigger bonsai shows at a convention ever,” proclaims Shiba, operator of Mt. Fuji Garden Center in Upland. He will be a demonstrator and instructor at the event that will have 18 workshops, daily demonstrations, auctions, Monte Carlo Nite, bonsai bazaar, and a drawing for a trip to Japan.
Owner of approximately 40 potted trees and about 100 in various stages of development, the chairman discloses, “One of the prize trees I have is a 40-year-old import from Korea, a trident maple. I’ll probably have that one in the show at the convention.”
Pomona-born Shiba is one of the younger members of the club at 48, and has been doing bonsai since 1970. “My dad (Katsumi Shiba) taught me here at the nursery,” he says. “As I got more interested, I took classes from Khan Komai (a veteran Bonsai instructor in San Gabriel), my initial formal teacher, at 13 or 14.”
He now teaches bonsai at the nursery on Saturday mornings. The class costs about $150 to $190 per student for six meetings and five trees to work on. “The classes get filled up,” he notes. “What happens is that of the people who take the class, about half of them go crazy over bonsai. I don’t know if it’s because of the Asian mystique or what, but I think it’s a personal challenge to create something that looks like a large natural tree in miniature.”
People new to bonsai can start on a budget and raise trees from younger specimens, and as they progress, they can afford nicer material to work on, Shiba says. “Of course, the cost for older trained trees may be in the hundreds of dollars.”
Interest in bonsai has increased greatly over the years, he comments. “In the 1970s, there were about 20 clubs, now there are probably more than 50 clubs in California ... Across the country, it might have doubled since the ‘70s.”
From the 1940s to the 1960s, a lot of the clubs were predominantly Japanese, but from the 1960s on they have become predominantly Caucasian, he points out. “In the past, some of the Japanese clubs didn’t want to give up secrets to the Caucasians. But you can’t do that any more.”
California Bonsai Society, co-founded by John Naka in 1958, meets the first Tuesday night of the month at the Ken Nakaoka Community Center in Gardena. It has 75 members, mostly from Santa Barbara on south, says Shiba, who joined in 1990. “We have always been pretty open to anybody. You just need to be referred by another member.”
Bonsai is “a fun hobby,” he states. “It’s a challenge to create something from a natural medium and to keep it healthy for years on end.”
In the California Bonsai Society’s Convention, the workshops require fees. But the bonsai exhibition is open to public for free. For convention details, call (909) 473-0099 or e-mail Shiba at ljshiba@juno.com. Crowne Plaza Resort Anaheim hotel is located at 12021 Harbor Blvd., Garden Grove; telephone (714) 867-5555.
Takeshi Nakayama is a free-lance journalist who lives in Walnut in Calif. He has written articles for the Nikkei West, Nichi Bei Times, Gardena Valley News and many other publications.