A Foliar Affair

October 2024

After dabbling with serpentine, scaly/slimy, or sentient subjects, I decided to return photographing plants, and its reasons are much of a surprise and twist to me.

Dealing with animals — reptiles in particular — proved to be bewildering and, in short, somehow full of drama. Not that I’d expect! Since most of them are personal dramas, I won’t spill ’em here out of a hope I won’t make them worse. It’s thrilling, to be honest, but I finally know what those photographers felt when they enter the perilous regions where their life is at stake.

Again, those are the things I don’t want to do. Yet I did it, with a tremendous risk.

None of this drama happened when I photographed plants. Somehow.

Two events approached me at the beginning of October: one promised cosplayers and one promised a plant like no other (if you have a thought of a typical cosplayer drama, well, it’s not it yet). My experiences with dealing with animals and people from the past couple of months brought mixed emotions that concluded I don’t want to deal with anything with vertebrae — or a cerebrum, for that matter — for a while.

Maybe with the exception of frogs. They are awesome.

So I headed to the plant event. It was as far as last time I went to ICE BSD, but out of a blind promise of some fancy-leaved Anthuriums and the very existence of Dionaea muscipula (Venus flytrap), I kept going.

Unlike the ones in Lapangan Banteng, this event was hosting a handful of well-known plant sellers who are also creators of notable hybrids or cultivars, as well as having international connections and influences. In fact, this event also promoted a future event when my future self would be the judge for my existence in said event.

It was Variegata dan Kita, held as a predecessor for FLOII 2024.

Despite (almost having) no drama, photographing plants also brought me some epiphany. I got to met Venus flytraps, and boy, were they dang small! Their size isn’t my concern — though had I brought a Raynox macro filter with me, it’d be less of a fuss — but how their leaves are heavily clumped. I couldn’t even single one out so I can emphasize their specialized leaves! Well, the show must go on. I just had to make it a groupie instead. Maybe the long-stalked cultivars aren’t here to rock the Indonesian plant market yet.

That wasn’t the epiphany that brought me down; it was the existence of variegated plants. I didn’t have much feeling for something similar in animals, esp. ball python morphs or cat/dog breeds with body builds heavily distorted from their actual species.

(to note on previous paragraph: there are a plentiful of reports on how albino/leucitic/pied morphs of snakes, regardless of species, have health issues, from minor to major ones. One that interests me is how often any morphs that involve major lack of pigments have poor vision and motor/nervous coordination, requiring heavy amounts of assistance throughout their lives. On cats/dogs one, I forever pray to whatever happens to pugs or Persians)

Maybe my feeling for variegated plants is much bigger because I used to own them as well (I never like odd-colored animals so I never get to understand albino/leucitic/pied animals). I know how hard it is to keep variegated plants alive and well, and it’s just bewildering to me.

Yet, they made their way to fancy contests, and we cheered for them.

This might be the 1.850.084.486.771.666.906th time I stated I’m a weird person, but Lord Heavens Above, I’d say I do not like variegated plants. It was not even a mutation anymore, but an intentional crippling of plants against their physiology. The variegated area in plants’ leaves lacks chlorophylls or any other cells that help a plant process their energy, making them basically a ‘handicapped’ part that would be better discarded. Like I said before, variegation exists as a mutation, but as expected, they don’t last long.

Now, there’re even secret recipes to make plants variegate.

I understand we strive for something unique, and that view also influence how VERITAS is shaped. We strive for something we never get to know exist, and we strive for these indescribable feelings that occur in us every time we saw exotic stuffs.

This is why despite my objection with the variegated plants trend, I have to include them in VERITAS. There’ll be a few, just to add some diversity to the photo project.

Like I once have the idea to include Yuka Takaoka — who were jailed for an attempted murder of someone she stalked for a long time — or any animals packed with venom/poison strong enough to kill hundreds of humans. A stark reminder that beauty exist even outside of our comfort zone; basically something disturbing, but you can’t help to admit they’re physically beautiful too.

I too shared this point of view during A Great Bond few months ago, when I saw how much variegated Gymnocalycium mihanovichii there are and the evident short-livedness of the ‘moon cacti’. I guess I was being hypocritical by not including them, but I didn’t really felt much about them so that might be why I skipped them.

I just don’t like them.

There are special places for variegated plants in people’s heart. There are also special places for oddly-colored snakes in people’s heart. I can’t deny that fact as not all of them are ‘created’ for profit purposes but, just like VERITAS, works of art.

It created prestige, recognition, connection, and value.

Just like you saying a banana taped to a wall is not art, we can’t deny the artistic value of how variegated plants in modern plant market come to be. I saw some of these variegated beings are not for sale, and those who are for sale are all for who are ‘creating’ such mutations. A banana taped to a wall is art, like it or not, but we definitely can say it’s a bad art. A disgusting art. A pathetic art.

Talking whether those variegated Anthuriums or Monsteras created by the notable plant experts hosting Variegata dan Kita and FLOII are a magnum opus or a disgusting piece of work is another matter. Talking art is all about nuance, understanding, and challenging our mindset and zeitgeist as a rational being. It challenged me as a person who will say no to variegated plants. It helped me understand the undertaking of hobbies, which is now under challenging times and immense pressures. I too see people thinking my works, esp. VERITAS, as a disgusting piece of work (considering the dramas I mentioned earlier) but I kept doing it.

Understanding nuance is one of the skills we lack. And those variegated leaves are there to teach you how to.