Does Chinese Bonsai involves Tree Torture?

I personally never looked at a bonsai art as a tree torture. A lot of people think that growing bonsai is cruel.

To make a bonsai from a regular trees you need to stunt their growth. You train them by not allowing the roots to grow and by cutting their branches. Wire binding technique is often compared with a torture of Japanese ladies.

One Chinese artists Shen Shaomin put together a bonsai collection, presented at Frey Norris Gallery, that definitely reminds of a tree torture.

Here is Frey Norris Gallery site http://www.freynorris.com/

Telling the truth, I was a little shocked by this bonsai series, but it raises some questions: Is Chinese Bonsai just a tree torture that people try to present as an art? Is Bonsai really cruel?

I understand how sometimes it could look like Bonsai is cruel, especially if you look at wiring technique. I found few images of bonsai trees in training.



People who understand bonsai art know that practices of wiring are used not to bind the tree and restrict growth, as is sometimes imagined, but to redirect growth.

Many of these same folk would not flinch at mowing lawns, pruning hedges or trimming their rosebushes. The beauty of the bonsai illusion has the power to create a sympathetic, emotional response in anyone. Bonsai helps us to understand our own place in the world.