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Topiary is the art of creating Sculpture s in the medium of clipped Shrub s and Sub-shrub s. The word derives from the Latin word for an ornamental Landscape Gardener , ''topiarius''. The shrubs and sub-shrubs used in topiary are evergreen (or "evergray"), have small leaves or needles, produce dense foliage, and have compact and/or columnar (e.g. fastigiate) growth habits. Common plants used in topiary include cultivars of Box (''Buxus sempervirens''), Arborvitae , Bay Laurel (''Laurus nobilis''), Holly (''Ilex'' spp.), Myrtle (''Eugenia'' spp., ''Myrtus'' spp.), Yew (''Taxus'' spp.), and Privet (''Ligustrum'' spp.). Shaped wire cages are sometimes employed in modern topiary to guide untutored shears, but traditional topiary depends on patience and a steady hand; small-leaved ivy can be used to cover a cage and give the look of topiary in a few months. HISTORY Origin Topiary dates from Roman times. Pliny's Natural History and the epigram-writer Martial both credit Cneius Matius Calvena, in the circle of Julius Caesar , with introducing the first topiary to Roman gardens, and Pliny The Younger described in a letter the elaborate figures of animals, inscriptions and cyphers and Obelisk s in clipped greens at his Tuscan villa (Epistle vi, to Apollinaris ). Within the Atrium of a Roman house or villa, a place that had formerly been quite plain, the art of the ''topiarius'' produced a miniature landscape (''topos'') which might utilize the comparable art of stunting trees, also mentioned, disapprovingly, by Pliny (''HN'' xii.6). Mediaeval Topiary From its European revival in the 16th century, topiary has historically been associated with the , pyramids, cones, spirals, and the like. Representational forms depicting people, animals, manmade objects have also been popular. Topiary at Versailles and its imitators was never complicated: low hedges punctuated by potted trees trimmed as balls on standards, interrupted by obelisks at corners were the vertical features of parterre gardens. Sculptural forms were provided by stone and lead sculptures. In Holland however, the fashion for more complicated topiary designs, spread to England after 1660. The decline of topiary in the eighteenth century In England topiary was all but killed in fashion by the famous satiric essay on "Verdant Sculpture" that Alexander Pope published in ''The Guardian'', 29 September 1713 , with its mock catalogue descriptions of
In the 1720s and 1730s , the generation of James Bridgeman and William Kent swept the English garden clean of its hedges and mazes, and its topiary. After topiary fell from grace in aristocratic garden, however, it continued to be featured in cottagers' gardens, where a single specimen of traditional forms, a ball, a tree trimmed to a cone in several cleanly separated tiers, meticulously clipped and topped with a topiary peacock, was passed on as an heirloom. The revival of topiary in English gardening parallels the revived " Jacobethan " taste in architecture, and John Loudon in the 1840s was the first garden writer to express a sense of loss at the topiary that had been removed from English gardens. The following generation, represented by Shirley Hibberd , rediscovered the charm of specimens as part of the mystique of the "English Cottage Garden ", which was as much invented as revived from the 1870s: It may be true, as I believe it is, that that the natural form of a tree is the most beautiful possible for that tree, but it may happen that we do not want the most beautiful form, but one of our own designing, and expressive of our ingenuity" Topiary, which had featured in a few 18th-century American gardens, came into favor with the Colonial Revival gardens and the grand manner of the American Renaissance , 1880–1920. The title character in Tim Burton 's movie '' Edward Scissorhands '' is lauded for his skill in the art; a real-life topiary artist is one of the subjects of Errol Morris 's '' Fast, Cheap And Out Of Control ''. The beginning of a concern with the revival and maintenance of historic gardens in the 20th century led to the replanting of the topiary Maze at the Governor's Palace, Colonial Williamsburg in the 1930s. TOPIARY IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY Notable Topiary Displays
;Europe
: A premier topiary garden started in the late 17th century by M. Beaumont, a French gardener who laid out the gardens of Hampton Court (which were recreated in the 1980s).
: A 16th-century garden revised in 1708
;North America at Epcot ]]
:100-year-old topiary garden of native white pine and arborvitae.
: One of the oldest topiary gardens in the United States, Green Animals combines geometric and animal topiary with other formal ornamental features.
: A topiary garden in Maryland established by award-winning topiary artist Harvey Ladew in the late 1930s. Located approximately halfway between the north Baltimore suburbs and the southern Pennsylvania border. Ladew's most famous topiary is a hunt, horses, riders, dogs and the fox, clearing a well-clipped hedge, the most famous single piece of classical topiary in North America.
: A public garden in downtown Columbus that features a topiary tableau of Georges Seurat 's famous painting '' Sunday Afternoon On The Island Of La Grande Jatte ''.
SEXUAL TOPIARY Topiary can also express sexual themes. Gillian Greensite, director of UC Santa Cruz's rape prevention and counseling program, has been trimming her 7 m (20 foot) tall hedges to resemble a phallus and testicles (or, depending on one's perspective, breasts) since the late 1980s. In 2002 , an offended neighbor filed a complaint with the police. Upon investigation, the police declined to intervene due to Greensite's rights to free speech and artistic expression {Link without Title} . SEE ALSO REFERENCES
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