I haven't done any serious painting for quite a while. I passed my time working on my calligraphy piece with back-lighting while I was gravely ill. It was mechanical and did not involve too many art cells. I did some monkeying around with the now-you-see-it-now-you-don't fish piece just to amuse and humor myself. I needed to pick up the brush again before it becomes a stranger to me.
I decided the best way to get my feet wet again was to not take things too seriously. Doodling would be the ticket.
I had planted some water lilies in the pond behind my house. I housed them in a container and put mesh on top of the container to keep ducks and geese away from the bulbs. Thus, waterfowls and flowers were my favorite subject matters. Unfortunately, my containers were all dug up and disposed of when the pond was dredged to make it deeper. I decided that I would do my doodling on flowers and perhaps a blue heron, since the heron had been visiting the pond for the bull frogs lately. Lotus would be an interesting alternative to water lily to paint, since it is a favorite subject matter in Chinese painting and I had spent quite a few pieces of Xuan on them, upon the insistence of my teachers. Learning by rote! Lotus flowers symbolize the ability to rise above something that might be noxious and not pleasant (mud and dirty water) and still stand tall and blossom into something really elegant.
Different ways of painting the lotus leaf,
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