The Prairie State Bonsai Society hosted the Bonsai Silhouette Show at Cantigny Park, displaying a total of 36 trees.
Bonsai Silhouette Show
“There are a number of national shows going on at this time of year,” said Matt Mazza, president of the Prairie State Bonsai Society. “They’re called silhouette shows and they show the bones of the trees and with these kind of shows you can really see the detailed work that the artist did.
A Bonsai tree is a tree in a pot and you would take a tree – it could be a very young tree or an older tree that you dig out of the ground from nature – and you place it into a pot and start pruning it in a manner that makes a very young tree or a tree newly placed in a pot look like a very old tree.
The Artistry
That’s part of the artistry of Bonsai and part of the skill and strategy of making a tree that’s very raw material into something that’s more perfect like these.
Some of us go with the line of thinking that you make a Bonsai tree for the next generation so some day somebody’s going to take that tree over and they may have their own ideas and make it something more of their own. In that respect, it’s constantly evolving.”
This was the group’s first show at Cantigny and they plan to hold one again next year.
Naperville News 17’s Aysha Ashley Househ reports.
