What is Chinese Brush Painting, an artform of lines

A Chinese artist in the 6th century indoctrinated the 6 canons of painting:

1. Rhythm
2. Strength in brush strokes, reflectig the spirit of the artist
3. Fidelity to nature
4. Appropiateness of color
5. Composition
6. Learn by emulation

Thus Chinese brush work is an artform of lines.  It is the brushwork that evokes emotion rather than the object, as evidenced by the relative order of importance suggested above.  Such is the instinct of this eastern artform.

Bi-Fa ( method of the brush ) or Gi Bun Gong ( the fundamentals ) obviously pertains to mastering the brush.  For most Chinese of my generation, brush writing was still taught in school and we sort of took it for granted.  Brush penmanship however is another story.  Student of calligraphy are taught to study and emulate calligraphy by famous masters, in different fonts.  We use a "Te" (template) as our study material.  The goal is not to make a tracing of these brushstrokes but to study them and "read" the intricacies.  This is when we learn how to use the tip, edge and belly of the brush to effect different shapes.

I am going to use just part of a character here to illustrate my point:

In this example, we start at

1. with the tip of the brush, forming the thin sliver
2. traverse with even pressure and speed to form a line of uniform width
3. stop, and the right side edge of brush forms the straight edge here
4. lift brush towards 10 o'clock, leaving the little corner as evidence of the brushstroke, then bring
    brush down in a continuous loop to
5. start with the tip of brush again
6. traverse down with increasing pressure, to form a line with gradually thicker profile
7. stop, allow the belly to fill the delta at the 4 o'clock position;  the left side edge of brush forms the
    straight edge   
8. lift brush towards 10 o'clock, again leaving the little pointy corner as evidence, loop the brush in
    the air towards 9
9. start a new downward stroke, showing the tip of the brush

Calligraphy is like choreographed dance steps; one can make connections from one pose to the next.
Writing with a brush does not mean wantonly putting a bunch of lines together to form a legible character!

 sample of my calligraphy

to be continued