Freeze the balls off brass monkey

Come off it!  I am not referring to the euphemistic colloquial description of testicles.  Or am I ?

I am just recounting my own experience with words and language.  As a non-native English speaker I often wonder where some English words or phrases come from.  In fact I was taking those words literally for quite a while because it was embarrassing to ask for its true meaning, and that many are as clueless as I am, even for native English speakers.

So with the advent of the web, I can do a lot of searching on my own, its authenticity and correctness notwithstanding.  At least it is  a starting point.  Now I know the phrase probably refers to the iron cannonballs falling off a brass tray which holds them.  Freezing and unfreezing supposedly cause the cannonballs to contract and shift, thus the stack collapses off the brass tray.  However, even this explanation is refuted by some.

Recently I had an experience with a nationally televised program which title borrows from Confucius and food.  The show tries to explore the intricacies of Chinese cuisines and in a tongue in cheek way tries to identify the origin of different foods by asking questions of the competing cultures; allowing them to assert dips on the origin of that food.  An example is whether cured ham, cured meat, pizza etc. originated from China.  You get the picture.  The host chef would visit chefs from different countries to get their opinion, and sometimes the show would even seek archaeological documentation and historians to support the claim.  We all know that this is not going to settle anything, but the production delves into a wide aspect of food related topics and culture and practices and the spin is fun and educational and certainly entertaining.

In episode #203 the host chef summoned a lot of effort to explain to the audience that the Chinese word 食 (eat) is made up of 人 (man) and 良 (good) by writing the Chinese character out on a chalkboard.  The assertion was that the Chinese word "eat" means it is good for a person (to eat).  I suppose such gallant and theatrical effort augments the sincerity and the authenticity of the explanation.

Except that I found the explanation to be contrived. Novel, perhaps.

As a native Chinese speaker I had taken the word for granted and never gave it any second thoughts.  Fueled by my questioning mind I explored the etymology of the word.  I wished I had my 辭源 ( a Chinese dictionary compendium of meaning, application and etymology of Chinese words) with me, but failing that I resorted to Baidu.

In this Chinese version of web encyclopedia, it stated that 良 actually means  quite a few things; "nice", "quite", "docile", "eternal", "virtuous" are some of the choices. Thus the word 食 (eat)  which combines "man" and "nice" could be construed to mean " to eat is good for a person", as the program suggested.

In the Chinese dictionary 辭海, the word 食 is treated as a radicle from which other words are built upon and not as separate radicles of  "man " and "nice".  In other words, Chinese language and writing treats 食 as a single word, and not divided into two separate components as asserted by the food show program.  Allow me to draw a parallel with English words: alcoholic means containing alcohol, acidic means sour.  These are examples of separating a word into 2 components to get the gist of word.  The same rule however does not apply to the word "antic".  

Actually the word 食 has nothing to do with either "man" or "good" or "nice"  The word 食 is a transformation from ancient pictography which painted a picture of food with a cover on it.

The left symbol is the original oracle bones script version, depicting a lid on edibles; and the word on the right is the modern day version.

I also consulted a Chinese site Guoxuedashi (國學大師) and it again points to the hieroglyphic script that shows a roof cover or lid or top, with the middle part resembling the vessel that holds food and the bottom part depicting a base that supports the vessel and the lid.  For the viewers who read Chinese, here is the excerpt from the site

I am attaching a picture of one such item (perhaps ?) from my fireplace mantel to show the lid and the container with base.

Thank you to the programming for leading me down the rabbit hole to explore my own culture.

I contacted the program to share with them my findings.  Their explanation is that Chinese characters can be analyzed at multiple levels, and that they had consulted with people who are Chinese born and educated in Chinese cuisines.  Now the first part of the sentence is correct but the second part is as valid as asking an avid British air traveler about the history of their Comet Airliner.  Better yet, what is the meaning of the archaic word Husbandman?  Any guesses as to how many native English speaker know the meaning of that word (Answer: farmer). I am a native born Chinese for more years than I care to elaborate, and yet I didn't know the true derivation of the word 食.  So the program producer pitted one native Chinese against another.  I posed the same question to some of my ethnic Chinese friends, and none of them could give me the correct answer.  We, as native Chinese, have taken our own writing for granted.  Equating a native Chinese as the de facto authority in Chinese word etymology is a slippery slope.  I understand that the prime objective of the food show is perhaps entertainment and not accuracy.  As they put it, that is subject to interpretation. Perhaps they have bit off more than they could chew. 

Picture me trying to elucidate "freeze the balls off brass monkey" by placing a monkey made of brass on a table and try to freeze its balls off?  Pretty absurd, isn't it?

Our local culture venue clearly had the same assumption by inviting Chinese calligrapher and painter to do demonstration of the brush art.  As these artists gyrated their brushes, slanting the shafts of their instruments into a dance, the audience, and the venue deemed beautiful and credible art was made.  The audience was given an opportunity to learn about the art of Chinese calligraphy and painting.  That was the intention.

This is an example of the calligraphy of the day

Notice the lack of definition in the turns in the blue circle.  This is due to failure to control the down force, forcing the hairs of the brush to work beyond their capability.  The heavy line preceding the blue circle is an indication of this impending doom.

Contrast that with this example

notice how all the twists and turns are resolute and decisive.  The energy of the brushstroke does not diminish throughout the writing.  The calligrapher had utmost control of the writing instrument.

The red circle again signifies a heavy smudge resulting from a failure to lift the brush.  As if to extinguish a cigarette.   In other words, lack of control of the brush.

Now look at an example of a proper brushstroke

notice in the first character within the blue circle, the lift to a point immediately preceding the dot  and also notice the dagger like down stroke from the second character.  And while you are at it, appreciate the twists and turns in the brushstrokes of this calligraphy piece. They are resolute and carry the energy through the strokes.

The green circle is a most abhorrent example. When it comes to the extended brushstroke, the tip of the brush must absolutely be smack in the center and the energy of stroke must be demonstrated as relentless. The stroke should feel and look like a dagger or a lightning rod, ready to discharge.  The calligrapher that day put down a dead snake with severed vertebrates and skin peeling off (my graphic animation is not meant to be derisive but to make a point).  It is obvious that instead of putting the tip of the brush right down the middle, he instead placed it on the left.  This is the same as driving a car with incorrect toe-in or toe-out angles.... your front tire is worn unevenly on the sides.  Then he decided to dress up the writing by making the line longer and pressed down again.  Unfortunately he never had the correct placement of the tip to begin with, so now the belly of the brush sat down and formed the triangular sliver hanging by a thread.

This is how it should be done

Thus the calligrapher of the day was not paying attention to the tip of the brush and that is the basis of Chinese brush calligraphy.  The tip to Chinese calligraphy is to know your tip.  He was clearly outside of his tessitura, to quote a vocal term.

When it came to painting demonstration, another artist presented a example of his work to validate his skill in brush painting

and then proceeded to give the audience something like this during the demonstration:

It simply did not compute.  Where did he learn to paint a highway lane dividing line as contour line of a mountain.  How did the brushstrokes from his sample work deteriorated into pencil drawing?

What I am alluding to here are examples of the failure of learning by rote.  We as students learn and study by emulating, copying works from classical masters.  This is true for calligraphy students and painting students alike.  Except that a lot of us, myself included, fail to internalize the fundamentals of the craft.  Thus we are forever in a state of emulating, stifling any sense of originality.  The result is when the source material, the Tie for example in calligraphy, is taken away, we are left with striking an awkward pose, like an amateur model.

Incidentally, Chinese seldom refer to brushstroke as a brushstroke per se.  We use the word 筆觸 (brush contact, brush touch) to denote brushstroke.  Thus more emphasis is placed on the contact patch than the simple act of motion of the brush.  There is a subtle yet critical difference in the interpretation of the brush movements.

It is not my intention to be especially harsh or nitpicking with these artists.  It is perhaps my fervent desire to separate fact from fiction; fad from substance.  Chinese brush art is a somewhat arcane form of art and some of the aesthetic cues are not evident to the casual onlooker.  The fact that some native Chinese can write something with a brush doesn't automatically qualify him as a Chinese calligrapher or a painter.  For that matter, anybody who wields a Chinese brush.  By knowingly maintaining my silence and not pointing out the proper yardstick to use  I would be contributing to the ignorance and the platitude.  To me, Chinese brush art appreciation and wine drinking, especially the red variety, share some similarities.  A wine consumer does not necessarily have to know the science of tannins, but one should be able to at least tell the difference that tannins contribute to the brew.  The average red wine drinker might not be able to identify a Shiraz from a Malbec, but should be at the very minimum able to taste the difference.  I am just trying my best to show the tannins in Chinese brush works.

Speaking of being esoteric, I retrieved a painting from my friend's garbage can.  It was discarded because my friend thought the painting was a failure, obviously.

I looked at the painting and was amazed at the quality of the brushstrokes.  To me, that was a prime example of how to "write" a painting.  I was in fact, jealous.

It reminded me of a past encounter, the Iquazu Falls, only more poetic

One has to appreciate all the discrete brushstrokes; the way the thundering water is depicted:

No smudging, not much of a wash.  Absolutely not a fill in the space with color type of "painting".
Even the simple birds are written strokes and not painted strokes.  As if a word is being written.

and be engulfed by the turbulent torrent.

So I convinced my friend to reconsider.

She did.

Incidentally the only alteration she did to the piece after reviving it from the garbage can was to add in the flock of birds to give the waterfalls some perspective.

The painting was entered in a local arts showcase competition but failed to jury in.

I know art appreciation is very subjective, but I also know that not all jurors here possess the education to properly appreciate Chinese brushwork.  I believe a lot of them are like the audience and the sponsors in the demonstration; skimming the surface and being ignorant of the tannins.  This is not a passive consolation or sour grapes.  It is just my perceived reality.

So my friend entered her painting at an international Chinese brush painting competition.  Second Place she was awarded.  Perhaps this is due to the nature of the competition, being limited to the genre of Chinese brush painting, instead of the local open call.  Nonetheless, justice and vindication at last.

Again, I am not trying to be a snob and be critical about the Foodie program or the local art scene that I described, not in a malicious way anyways.  I am trying to point out the less obvious and to address some of the misconceptions; about somethings that we often take for granted.

I am grateful that the Foodie program stirred me to find meaning in something as fundamental as 食.

I am grateful that the brass monkey is not a primate.

I am grateful that balls of brass monkey are not anatomical features.

Now I just need to investigate how cold the witch's tits are.

Wicker Basket Still Life

I publish my blog on the topic of Chinese Brush painting, but I have to delve into something very personal this time and it has nothing to do with painting.

 Today is my birthday.  What is significant is that I am not going to encounter this ever again.  I was born on November 11.  So regardless of what convention you use, date first, month first, or year first, today is 11-11-11, and I am going to publish this at 11:11.  Pardon my pensiveness.

My personal experience, and those of other novices whom I have dealt with, is that when we see
skinny lines, we automatically dialed down our grip and turned our brush into a point rather than a brush.  The result is the deposition of lines with a boundaries, but possessing no souls.

The concept of transmitting energy through the brush, penetrating the Xuan, past the felt pad, past the desk top is obscure but not mythical.  I suppose this is analogous to martial artists focusing past the pine board and punching through.  My mantra is let our brush make love to the paper, not just tickling the surface.

For my own practice, I chose to do a still life of a wicker basket.  The orderly array of weaves, thrown into this parabolic contour of the container, reminds me of something that the architect Frank Gehry might try to do.

It is important that I still try to write these lines instead of drawing them.  I tried to use a dry brush with varied ink tones to render the 3 dimensional appearance.  The shading effect is achieved  by using the belly of a dry brush.  This is a good way to ruin a brush, but  is a necessary collateral.
This kind of shading speaks of the T'sa technique mentioned in my prior blogs.  It puts down texture and changes light value.  The highlighted areas are void spaces.

This is a wonderful way to practice brush stroke, especially center tip stroke, without getting bored.

Bamboo Leafs Tutorial and Brush Pronation

As I am forced to deal with how to paint bamboo, I am increasing frustrated by my own ineptness  in rendering a good painting, and the difficulty in explaining the mechanics of the brush stroke, especially with regards to the leafs.

As I thumb through the "How To" books of painting bamboo, there are vast examples of how to paint and group the leafs in an ethereal array.   Sadly, very few of them reveal the underlying brush stroke.

I could only hark back to my days of learning bamboo.....center tip, center tip, fast, sharp strokes.
Fine!  I get all that, but how do I add variety to the shape of the leafs??  My  relentless practice just adds more clones  to my collection, neither rhythmic, nor eclectic.  My teacher just kept saying, watch me, do as I do.

So what does pronation ( and supination) has to do with painting bamboo leafs?

Everything !

When we hold our brush vertical with the plumb line, anything added pressure will force the belly of the brush to sit evenly on both sides of the center line.  Thus a rather symmetrical leaf shall appear.
If we hold the brush with the shaft pointing towards our body, then more of the brush belly would be making contact below the center line.  Thus a leaf with a skewed right flank will take shape.  Conversely if hold the brush with the shaft away from our body, the result is a leaf with a skewed left flank.

This discovery prompted me to think in terms of pronation or supination.  Evidence of those is very apparent in how we wear out the heels of our shoes.    A pronated ankle causes the inside edge of the shoe heel to wear out  (most evident for people afflicted with  Knock Knees), and a supinated ankle wears on the outside edge of the heel.  Supposedly one could tell an introvert from an extrovert just by looking at the heels of their shoes.  Anyways, when the palm is twisted towards our body, that is the supinate position, and pronate is when the palm is twisted away from our torso.  Therefore for a right handed person, a supinate  grasp of the brush will result in a bamboo leaf with the fat side to the right of the vein, and a pronated angle of the brush will have a heftier left side.

The significance of pronation and supination  that if we want bamboo leafs  to look lively and natural, we should paint them as clusters rather than individual leafs.  Let me be more succinct, we are going to paint 4 leafs in a cluster.  As we embark on the first leaf (positioned to the extreme left of the cluster), our brush is in a natural supinated position.  As we move over to the next leaves ( to the right ) the angle of the brush is incrementally decreasing towards vertical plumb ( true center tip ) and progressing towards pronation as we drift to the right side of the cluster.  My assertion is that we should try to paint the leaves as a combination of multiple related, continuous strokes, separated only by lifts of the brush, but no hiccups in flow.

The last picture posted above is an example of painting the leafs in groups of 3 or 4 and allowing pronation to occur naturally, thus the body of our brush strokes exhibit different profiles of the leaves.  As the ink soot leaves the brush the strokes become lighter and dryer.  Exploit this trait to lay down  the fainter brush strokes, which help to create depth.
The following is lifted from a "How To" book on painting bamboo leafs and is just a small sample of the hundreds of possibilities of arranging and writing bamboo leafs.  The problem with this rote learning, as I come to realize, is that we are so bound by these prescribed imagery that what we do at best is regurgitation of a lifeless pose.  What these illustrations do not tell us is the assembly of  dance movements that lead to these poses.  If only we can paint the leafs not as individual blades, but as a community, and allow our wrists to go through the various and natural angles of pronation and supination, to imitate the natural growth sequence of the clusters, then our efforts shall be a rewarded with dynamic strokes.

The embedded video shall illustrate my attempt at painting the bamboo leafs pictured above, and some of the points that I have opined.  Granted the leafs do not look that good (just a frustrated painter, but my theory is still sound ) nonetheless the final product is not without emotional salvage.

Pronate, Supinate, do not Regurgitate ! 

My new mantra.