Marco Invernizzi Bonsai School
@ Willowbog Bonsai

The Marco Invernizzi Bonsai School is a unique and innovative development at Willowbog Bonsai with one of the best Bonsai artists in Europe.

>> Report & images from the FIRST Marco @ Willowbog session
>> Report & images from the SECOND Marco @ Willowbog session

The idea for the Marco Bonsai School @ Willowbog was born out of a sense that the level of knowledge and competence of workshop participants was not keeping pace with the higher levels of bonsai in their collections. Marco felt that because in a conventional hands-on workshop the enthusiast’s whole focus was on completing the prescribed work on a given piece of material he was not able to pass on as much information as he would like to be able to do. Certainly there was time at the start of most workshops for a general discussion on the participant’s trees but once the work began then people were not really able to concentrate on anything than other than completing the tree.

Therefore, in the school sessions although the teaching was at times based on the practical work that any given piece of material may require, there would be no pressure for that work to be completed in the session but instead might be set as work to be completed at home by the student between school sessions, a bit like homework possibly! This would allow the student to concentrate entirely on absorbing the information imparted by the teacher, taking notes as well for example, if so desired.

Because of the sheer quantity of knowledge and experience that Marco has to give he was always adamant that he needed each school session to be two consecutive days in duration, three times a year, spaced out throughout the twelve months.

The course was not to be a conventional curriculum based format but will be based on a variety of themes sometimes of a seasonal nature, sometimes it may be species based but certainly in the beginning it included a back to basics approach to technique which ensured that students had a chance to unlearn bad habits and make it easier for Marco to deal with the likely variation in levels of knowledge, ability and experience of the participants.

The Marco Invernizzi Bonsai School is no longer running at Willowbog Bonsai