A Chinese blue and white hand-painted porcelain dish from 1790–1840, 4.13 x 25.08 x 20 cm, exemplifies the idealized landscapes of the East popular in the West at that time.
After centuries of limiting commerce, the Chinese began to promote trade by participating in world’s fairs in the nineteenth century, such as the 1876 Centennial International Exhibition in Philadelphia and the 1915 Panama-Pacific World Exposition in San Francisco. War in the world and China’s own internal turbulence prevented them from exhibiting again until the 1982 Knoxville World Expo. After President Richard M. Nixon visited China in 1972, there was renewed interest in Chinese arts in the United States, including public Chinese gardens. Interestingly, Chinese gardens were created in Canada at the same time.
The Chinese art form of penjing—the art of creating miniature landscapes on trays, sometimes with plants alone, sometimes with rocks and plants, or other times with rocks only—may have played a role in China’s presentations at the world’s fairs. Where it surely had an impact at an earlier time, however, was in Japan.
| Chinese Gardens in North America after 1980 | |
| 1981 | Astor Chinese Garden Court, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, New York |
| 1986 | Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada |
| 1990 | Montréal Botanical Garden, Montréal, Québec, Canada |
| 1996 | The Margaret Grigg Nanjing Friendship Garden, Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, Missouri |
| 1999 | Chinese Scholar’s Garden, Snug Harbor Cultural Center, Staten Island, New York |
| 2000 | LanSu Chinese Garden, Portland, Oregon |
| 2008 | The Huntington, San Marino, California |
A 19th century Japanese woodcut print, American merchant delighted with miniature cherry tree, 35 x 23 cm, shows a man admiring a bonsai, possibly thinking of his wife.
JAPAN
Over centuries, many elements of Chinese civilization migrated eastward to Japan, ranging from the concept of a pictographic alphabet to the tea ceremony. Typically, the Japanese would embrace a Chinese model, then refine it over time to suit their own culture’s aesthetic sensibilities. Some say this trend reached an apex of expression with the importation of Zen Buddhism in Japan in the fourteenth century, crystalizing during the following centuries into forms familiar to us today. The Chinese art form of penjing is a paradigm of this trend. Penjing arrived in Japan with other Chinese arts, then evolved into the more highly codified geometric and controlled art form of Japanese bonsai.
Also following the Chinese pattern, Japan became the new source of Asian inspiration after its opening to expanded foreign trade by Commodore Matthew C. Perry in 1854. Called japonisme, this infatuation in the West with Japanese style and design, especially lacquerware, textiles and woodblock prints, emerged towards the end of the nineteenth century and into the beginning of the twentieth. It was bolstered by Japan’s own efforts to expand awareness of its country and wares through participating in world’s fairs and expositions, often highlighting gardens and plants.
Like China, Japan exhibited at the Philadelphia Centennial International Exposition of 1876. The Japanese presentation included a garden, which featured a pavilion with a bonsai display. Bonsai were also shown at Japan’s exhibition at the Chicago World’s Fair in Illinois in 1893, and at the Louisiana Purchase Exhibition in St. Louis, Missouri in 1904. Japan also had a significant presence at the Panama Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco, California in 1915, with an exhibit area more than twice the size of China’s. Once again, bonsai were shown, and one tree from the Exposition is known to survive to this day—the Domoto Trident Maple now at the Pacific Bonsai Museum in Federal Way, Washington.
THE UNITED STATES
At the same time that Japan was creating Japanese gardens for world’s fairs and expositions, private individuals began to create Japanese-style gardens around the United States. The Japanese Hill and Water Garden at the Morris Arboretum near Philadelphia, the Japanese Garden at The Huntington in San Marino, California, and the Japanese Garden at Maymont in Richmond, Virginia, were created before World War I as private gardens, which were later opened to the public. The Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden was a public garden from its opening in 1915.
While many people were introduced to Japan through its participation in international fairs and expositions, others made the long journey to the country itself and discovered its distinctive culture in person. Among the individuals who traveled to Japan were the Honorable Larz Anderson and his wife Isabel. Anderson served as Ambassador to Japan under President William Howard Taft, returning to the United States in 1913. While in Japan, the Andersons purchased bonsai at the Yokohama Nursery Co. for their home in Massachusetts, and later bequeathed them to the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University, where some can be seen today.
Ambassador Larz Anderson bought bonsai from the Yokohama Nursery Co. in Japan in 1913. Later, the company exhibited at the 1915 Pacific Exposition in San Francisco.
| Select Japanese Gardens with Bonsai in North America | ||
| Date Created | Bonsai Added | Location |
| 1876 | Philadelphia Centennial Exposition, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | |
| 1894 | Japanese Tea Garden, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, California | |
| 1911 | 1968 | Japanese Garden, The Huntington, San Marino, California |
| 1911 | Maymont Japanese Garden, Richmond, Virginia | |
| 1915 | 1925 | Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Brooklyn, New York |
| 1918 | Hakone Estate and Garden, Saratoga, California | |
| 1949 | 1976 | Asian Collections and National Bonsai & Penjing Museum, U.S. National Arboretum, Washington, D.C. |
| 1957 | 1957 | Japanese-style Garden and Bonsai, Hillwood Estate, Museum & Gardens, Washington, D.C. |
| 1958 | Shōfūsō Japanese House and Garden, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | |
| 1960 | Japanese Garden, Washington Park Arboretum, Seattle, Washington | |
| 1960 | Nitobe Memorial Garden, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada | |
| 1961 | Japanese Garden, Bloedel Reserve, Bainbridge Island, Washington | |
| 1963 |