Bonsai Society President to Lecture on Ancient Art at Bucknell University

It started in June 1988 with six people and a shared obsession: the ancient art of dwarfing trees. Nearly four decades later, the organization they built is stepping onto a university stage. The Weis Center for the Performing Arts at Bucknell University will welcome Carl Achhammer Jr., bonsai artist and president of the NEPA Bonsai Society, on Wednesday, April 1 at noon in the Weis Center Atrium. The lecture, titled "The Art of Bonsai," is free and open to the public.

Achhammer is among the most recognizable names in the Northeast Pennsylvania bonsai community. He is a founding member of the NEPA Bonsai Society, and his connection to the craft runs deep. He has been growing bonsai for nearly 20 years and has taken his practice into the classroom, teaching bonsai at Misericordia University in Dallas Township. Beyond university settings, he operates under the name Zenchaser Bonsai, running workshops where participants build their own trees from the ground up.

A great passion for the art motivates Achhammer to constantly seek out new information, tree knowledge, and techniques to pass on to his students. That impulse toward education is consistent with the society's founding mission. Its objectives remain to provide a place for members to expand and share their knowledge and skills, and to advance and promote interest in bonsai among the general public in Northeast Pennsylvania.

Achhammer has previously spoken about the barriers that keep newcomers from picking up the art. He has noted that many people are put off because they think they need to work on the trees constantly, but that's not the case: "Except for watering, some trees only need to be worked on several times a year." He has also said that bonsai is growing exponentially across the country, a trajectory that makes a free public lecture at a major university feel well-timed.

The NEPA Bonsai Society began in June 1988 with a meeting of six people who shared a common interest in the ancient art of dwarfing trees. Organized that same year, the group holds demonstrations, workshops, and trips throughout the year, as well as hosting guest speakers to discuss the art. The April 1 lecture at Bucknell marks a natural extension of that outreach, this time to a campus audience in Lewisburg.

The noon lecture in the Weis Center Atrium requires no registration and carries no admission fee.