Bonsai

These small trees appear in many of my drawings because they embody the tension I explore in all my work: the human desire to shape nature, and nature’s quiet determination to shape itself anyway.

I grow several bonsai—some decades old, others still young and full of promise. Each one shows me how life adapts. How roots cling to the cracks of a stone. How a trunk twists to survive wind, drought or gravity. These are not merely miniatures; they are living stories of persistence.

When I draw, a bonsai often becomes my starting point. Especially in moments of creative block. Trees don’t judge how a drawing begins. They don’t demand perfection. They simply exist—patient, grounded, and present.

That presence removes pressure.

It lets me return to Flow.

In my surrealist and altermodernist work, bonsai act as metaphors:

for resilience, for the human need to control, and for the beauty that emerges when we finally stop forcing and start observing.

This philosophy also shapes the way I care for my own trees. It pushes me toward a clip-and-grow approach — slow, patient shaping through natural growth — which I often combine with rope instead of wire. It feels closer to dialogue than domination, guiding the tree gently rather than bending it into submission.

They remind me that even the smallest living thing carries a universe of strength.

And they remind me why I draw.