Bonsai | Inheritance of Living Art with Takahiro Mori

Bonsai is a Japanese art form that recreates the beauty of nature in a single pot. Through careful cultivation and shaping of buds, leaves, and branches, bonsai craftsmen create a miniature but realistic scale of full-grown trees that serve as a work of living art. Bonsai trees are incredibly fragile and require daily maintenance, and can live for hundreds of years with proper care and dedication. They are often passed down the family line for generations, becoming a treasured inheritance that connects the past to the future.

This program will feature a presentation and live demonstration by bonsai master craftsman Takahiro Mori on the history of bonsai and its role in passing down culture and tradition to future generations. Mori, a Cultural Envoy appointed by the Japanese Ministry of Culture, will share his insights and philosophy on bonsai, and introduce the techniques he makes use of in his practice. Participants will also engage with Mori in a Q&A session and receive complimentary gifts from the master to take home.

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Instructor Profile

Takahiro Mori
Beginning his career at 22—an unusually late age to enter training in bonsai—Mori was apprenticed under Koji Tsukahara at Koushou-en in Ibaraki Prefecture. He then served as a bonsai expert at the Omiya Bonsai Art Museum in Saitama Prefecture from 2006 to 2009 before opening his own nursery, Bonsai Mori, in 2013. As a bonsai master craftsman, Mori primarily engages in the maintenance of bonsai owned by aficionados and other masters. He also conducts workshops for beginners at his atelier Bonsai Mori and has been appointed a Cultural Envoy by the Japanese Ministry of Culture to promote the art of bonsai abroad through workshops, classes, and demonstrations.