Happy New Year Year of the Rabbit

                                                                            兔氣揚眉

                                                   新年快樂

    Happy New Year

Finishing up my Jade Rabbits on the Moon

Now that I have the main residents situated on the moon, it is time to paint in the background. As I had alluded to before, the inspiration for this composition is the mythology of the shadows on the moon representing the dwelling of Chang'e and her rabbit.  I am therefore needing to exploit the shadows.  I am choosing to paint a classical pine tree with its branches matching the shadows.  I am also placing the branches strategically so that they take up and blend in with some of the bigger pieces of fibers on the paper.  

I need to add a branch to account for the shadows in the middle of the moon

I now paint in the branches of the pine tree.  Notice how the big piece of fiber on the upper right side is painted into part of the branch.  I don't want to trivialize the word "organic", but this is as organic as one gets.

So the tree and stuff looks a little sparse for shadows.  A little dressing up with a broad brush wash and dabbing resolves that issue.  I am happy that the details of the tree and branches etc. are well blended into the shadows.  That allows more room for the viewer to conjure up their own interpretation of the tree. 

Putting some rouge on the face of the moon.  She looks pretty now.  

 

One of my non-Asian friend looks at the work and says "you have a bonsai tree in there".  "How astute!" I tell her.  Bonsai comes from the Chinese word Penzai, or Penjing which literally means the craft of artistically staging potted plants.  As I am painting a rabbit within the framework of Chinese mythology, a Chinese style pine tree is called for.  Pine trees are symbols of longevity.  The twisted and knurly branches are more than aesthetic poses; they also pertain to the ability of withstanding adversity and thriving despite of it.   Actually within the framework of Chinese mythology the tree on the moon is purported to be an osmanthus.  However some scholars would refute that and claim the tree to be Cinnamomum pedunculatum and not osmanthus.  Hopefully my pine is not going to be ridiculed. 

I am now at the juncture of a self-imposed dilemma.  I had intended to just do silhouettes of trees and rabbits as the shadows on the moon and I had no intention of depicting any three dimensional realism to the rabbits.  So I am now debating whether to paint in the eyes of the rabbits.  I am just being an idiot, getting hung up on something that is now irrelevant, especially since I've come so far down the road of realism.

Then I am reminded of the fact that our dragon boats go through the ceremony of painting the eyeballs in on the day of the races.  Eyeballs give the dragons life and spirit.  It would be quite a taboo for me to turn in something that purportedly is nice and auspicious; pertaining to the coming New Year and yet is lacking eyeballs.  What would rabbits without eyeballs portend?

I can't help but recall the New Year's card sent out by a local Chinese tourist/cultural venue.  The fact that this institution is not run by Chinese is beside the point, but they asked some poor Chinese person to paint them a New Year's card for the Year of the Rat and sent them out to all their sponsors and partners.

The quality of the painting notwithstanding but the fact that this card was used to welcome the year of the Rat is deplorable.  Can you imagine a New Year with two vermin eating up your food staple?  Come on people, this is not the time to be cute.  Find something auspicious to depict the rats.  This was such a taboo, especially if one is just a little bit superstitious.  Yes customs can be pedantic.  Look what happened to the year 2020, the year of the Rat!

I shall not and will not be guilty of painting New Year's zodiac animals with no eyeballs!

Launching my Year of the Rabbit painting

I am feeling comfortable about my rabbits and the 22nd of January will be here before long so I better step on the gas and put some rabbits down on paper for real, or else I won't have a greeting card for Chinese New Year.

When I think of the astrological Rabbit I inevitably look to the moon.  I suppose this has to do with my culture and what is instilled in me.  I grow up learning about the legend of Chang'e, our goddess of the moon, and the rabbit is her faithful companion up there. 

In our Chinese mythology, it was said that there used to be ten suns and they were causing unbearable heat to our world.  Chang'e was married to an archer, who went out and shot down 9 suns, leaving just the one we see today.  For his valiant effort he was given an elixir of immortality by the Emperor of the Heaven.  He didn't wish to be immortal all by himself so he gave the elixir to his wife Chang'e for safe-keeping.  One day someone was trying to steal the elixir and Chang'e in an attempt to prevent the elixir from falling into wrong hands, drank all the elixir herself.  She thus became immortal and chose the moon as her residence, leaving her husband behind.  The Emperor of the Heaven caught wind of this and granted Chang'e the ability to meet her husband annually, on the 8th full moon of the year.  Hence the August Moon Festival.  A quick check on the internet shows there are many versions of this legend and what I am telling might sound different from what other people have learned.  I suppose the only real significance is that we believe Chang'e is the goddess of the moon, and the rabbit keeps her company.

I suppose it is not difficult to conjure up stories about beings on the moon, especially when the moon surface is represented by unknown shadows and shapes.  That floating luminous object that changes from a ball to a sliver in the night sky is in itself an object of pondering and bewilderment.  I need to confess, the music of Rusalka's  "Song to the Moon" is playing as I am writing.  It is also interesting that the same moon appears different when viewed from different parts of the world.  

I took a picture of a full moon in the States:

and the same moon viewed from Australia:

Notice the orientation of the shadows on the moon.  There is a 90 degrees shift.  

Now that I've convinced myself that the moon is the proper staging for my zodiac Rabbit, I intend to somehow incorporate my rabbits into the shadows of the moon.

I must also mention that the name given to the rabbit on the moon is Jade Rabbit.  Jade comes in many colors and white jade is a symbol of purity.  

I am using my fibrous Xuan again; it shows interesting strands of fiber.  I suppose the craters on the moon aligns with my fixation on the texture of the paper.  The native color of the paper has a beige straw tint to it, perhaps it can pass for the illuminated surface of the moon?  We shall see. 

The back of the paper seems more fibrous and rough, and I happen to like it.  So that will be the side I paint on.

I am drawing a circle of about 13 inches in diameter; a size that would fit on a 16x16 canvas when mounted.  I am settling on painting 2 rabbits.  Somehow two is more interesting than one, and it is easier for me to coax some sort of a sentiment from posing two animals.  I am also not trying to paint the legend of Chang'e, as the rabbits are the real protagonists, thus whether it is one or more rabbits is not critical. I am leaning towards painting my rabbits more as a silhouette, scant in details but hope to tie in with my shadow  on the moon theme.

Perhaps I am thinking of the aventurine jade too much.  My rabbit has a greenish tint to it.  I am going to tone it down with a heavier dose of titanium white. 

A cute couple!

Almost time for rabbits

The next zodiac animal is the rabbit, and our Lunar New Year falls on January 22 for 2023.  That means I better start planning on my zodiac painting now.

I love putting animals and birds into my painting, but rabbit is definitely a new subject for me.  My preparation involves just grabbing a piece of paper and start drawing with no particular agenda.  I hope to be conversant with the animal and hopefully I would be able to portray a personality to the rabbit, instead of just being vapid.  Vapid rabbit rhymes in spoken language, but not in paintings, ha ha.