Why should a tree bow to the viewer?

[Gabler]

I've seen it mentioned in a couple of recent threads, and it seems like the question deserves its own thread.

My own answer is just speculation, but that speculation gets to the heart of why we grow bonsai: trees help us to feel at home, and a bowing tree invites the viewer to approach. In undergrad, I studied prehistorical archaeology and human evolution. In a introductory course, my professor emphasized that when humans began to walk upright, we did not stand up from the ground—we descended from the trees. Primates are an arboreal order of mammals. The earliest known primates were tiny squirrel-like creatures that took refuge from megafauna in the trees. This is what our great great great great ... great great great grandma looked like:



The tree was a source of food and shelter. Our ancestors probably had no reason to ever leave the trees, except maybe to find water. For over sixty million years, our ancestors lived their entire lives in the treetops. It was only about two million years ago that we began to descend from the trees and walk upright, repurposing our branch-grabbing hands for grasping tools. It is no coincidence that we love trees today. It is no exaggeration to say that a love of trees is in our blood. It is only natural that we prefer trees which beckon toward us.

 

[Joelshack2362]

Glad our great great great great grandparents had the courage to leave the tree tops. If not our story would be alot different. Again for me what is considered too progressive and what's too conservative is there a true balance? Maybe it's okay to have courage and try different bow angels or directions. I have learned over my very few years in bonsai that my eyes attract more too trees that bow towards the viewer. My few developing trees i have brainstormed designs that bow towards the viewer. I guess time will tell.

 

[KateM]

She's cute and we love trees, but it looks like a beginng of another rabbit hole.

 

[rockm]

Has nothing really to do with welcoming or Asian formalities. It has to do with fooling the viewer’s eye. The “bow” pushes the top of the tree towards the the viewer the close the viewer gets. That makes the viewer’s eye percieve the top of the tree towering over them. Much the same way that as you approach a full size tree the more it feels like the tree towering over you

Simply put. It adds to the visual foreshortening of the bonsai’s trunk.

 

[Brian Van Fleet]

Yep, makes the tree seem taller. Also, somehow over time, they seem to develop this tendency anyway, through pruning and styling without much deliberate effort. It’s amusing to look down the line of my benches and see most of the trees have that slight forward lean.