I’m not on Instagram, but a friend who is on it shared this with me.
Currently on display at the Aichi Triennal exhibition in Japan, an atrium garden by Cypriot artist Christodoulos Panayiotou displays rose seedlings rejected by hybridizers. It seems to be a theme he’s been exploring for a while.
Here are the screenshots she shared with me:
More pics at link : https://www.instagram.com/p/DOvzwtkksi7t00An3C8wvAB4V3K0Rr-7THiNBk0/?img_index=7&igsh=MTVrdHFtaGdsN3RsdA==
If I were hybridizing as a business, I could cull mercilessly. But as a hobbyist, it’s easy to get sentimental. That’s why I have an area of the property I call “The Land of Misbegotten Roses”.
There really are a lot of ugly and sick roses that are discarded, but I feel for those that are lost because they don’t meet some narrow criteria. I’m sure we’re losing some one of a kind beauties because of this.
Tony
Beauty really IS in the eye of The Beholder, eh?!
What a fascinating exhibit; I wonder how people are reacting? Maybe I’ll do a Google…
Edit (cpl hours later): I Googled him. Totally worth it!
@lee_hull I love “the land of misbegotten roses”! What a great name, sounds like something out of a fairytale! I would keep more of mine, probably, if I had more space!
@Rosarian_Du_Nord and @VanIsleDWSmith , I think it’s so cool that he’s bringing light to the hybridizing process.
This display of “rejected roses” reminds me of the 19th century “ Salon des Refusés ” where artists whose work was deemed unsuitable by the French Academy were displayed. And yes some of them turned out to be future greats whose works are highly valued today. Tastes are so subjective and variable over time.
By the way, if anyone is interested, the hybridizer who provided the seedlings for the exhibition is Yagi Hayato. You can see some of his roses on his website , including some rather unusual beauties with prominent proliferated centers.
Those are some amazing hybrids! Wow the pink one with the cream center is amazing!
Tony, the rose ‘Kim Rupert’ exists today because I bought it directly from Ralph Moore (for one dollar!) because he had rejected it after it’s first few bloom cycles. It wouldn’t exist today if I hadn’t decided that it looked like it deserved another chance to show its merits.
So yes — hybridizers inevitably make choices that may cull a potentially valuable new rose from testing. When you grow 50,000 seedlings a year, you have to make quick, ruthless judgements, and sometimes that means nice plants get lost.
Sometimes seedlings intended for disposal produce beautiful offspring. In the first photo ,the already discarded Rose “Duc de Guiche” seeding x free polination. The next photo it its child.
For me, the joy is in the culling and then crossing best with best. My criteria: health, vigor, compactness, and hybrid-tea form–without the latter, why not just grow the easy geranium.
