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The areas prepared in the various exhibitions partly reproduce a tokonoma. They are usually both made up of a background and a plain |
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neutral coloured level surface, precisely measured and about 80 cm high. The structure mustn’t display any elements which may disturb the viewing of the plant. |
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Usually each exhibition displays only one bonsai.
It will always be placed beside other elements such as little herbaceous plants (shitakusa), small |
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statues representing animals (tempai) with good luck meanings and landscape stones that increase its beauty. The bonsai’s arrangement, the choice and setting of a second object on the surface, enhances the most important element
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and recalls the precise aesthetic rules set by the season (which the arrangement must emphasize), the foliage and the tree’s variety.
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Visiting an exhibition you may think that each arrangement doesn’t require the use of such a wide surface, but the bonsai needs a suitable
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space for all its features to be admired: the more it’s important and beautiful the more this space must be wide.
Besides, whereas usually in an exhibition it’s the single object displayed that captures the attention, in a bonsai exhibition it’s the entire arrangement which is very |
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important as even the empty spaces are valuable in order to achieve
harmony as a whole.
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Once used as a bed, the tokonoma in the traditional Japanese house is a defined space in which are displayed bonsais, floral arrangements (ikebana),
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painted objects (sumie), texts written in refined calligraphies (shodo), small statues (tenpai)
and stones (suiseki), according
to precise aesthetic rules. This
exhibition is usually arranged by |
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the landlord who exploits it in order to interpret and convey the feelings linked either to a special moment of the year or a state of mind.
Therefore in front of a tokonoma you can either meditate or share these feelings with a guest.
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A small bronze, wooden or ceramic sculpture used for the tokonoma’s |
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arrangement. It can represent a person,
an animal or an object.
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The arrangement of one or more herbaceous plants set beside a bonsai or
a suiseki in order to decorate the tokonoma.
It visually balances the bonsai’s
size in the space and emphasizes with its shape, colours and blossom the
season in which it is displayed.
It can be held in a pot or laid on a stone or
ceramic slab. |
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