Pavilion

Having to do a themed exhibition right after a trip overseas while I was in the stupor of jet lag is definitely not fun.  It's amazing what adrenalin does to a person.

After the anti-climax, I needed to get back into the swing of things again.

The brush felt so foreign.  I have not touched it for a while.  Could the heart grow fonder after the short absence?  I shall find out.

I decided to reacquaint myself to the brush by doing some doodling.  Well, sort of. 

I did some grass style calligraphy; just to get the blood flowing.

I talked about appreciating the brush stroke during my spiel at the exhibition, so I decided to pay extra attention to  my brushstrokes.  I want to work on my center tips.

I deem the lines of a Chinese pavilion interesting.  I want to portray the high sweeping ridge line.
I want to capture the emotions emanating from the dancing soffits.

I started out with a brush saturated with ink to write the arching ridge line.  I wanted a moist, wholesome look to the lines to reflect on the massiveness and the energy that these lines give off.
This is going to be a pavilion in a lake, a la classical gardens for the rich bureaucrats in the old days.

 

Using light ink, the surrounding covered breezeway was put in place.

Writing in the tree, paying attention to leave a little space between the branches and the pavilion, to establish  perspective.

Using Green Label 3, I dressed the branches and the waters edge.

I know it's a cliche but I just couldn't resist painting the reflections on the water.  I tried to be scant in the details.  I restrained myself from using more color to the painting.  I wanted to keep the airy, impressionistic feel of the paining.  I surmise that my cinnabar colored chop will add that speck of punctuation that I was look for.  It had to be strategically placed.

My dots seemed too evenly spaced.  They were restrained and not interesting.  This is something I need to work on.

Wassup

Just wanted to drop by and say Hi !

Relationship, no, not that kind

Since I had quite a few pages left on my drawing pad, I thought I would fill some pages with quick charcoal sketches.

Armed with this sample drawing, I went on to painting with brush on bamboo paper.  I really like the texture and warm color of this paper.  There is something very organic about this piece of fancy butt wiper.

I don't know why I truncated the bodies into halves.  Perhaps I thought it was a more interesting composition?  Perhaps I thought the relationship of the two geese were intriguing.  Were they chatting, greeting or quarreling?  Who knows!  In my mind their necks seemed to be the story teller.  Their  body language  was  translated into neck language.  This is a plausible explanation for painting just half a goose.

I wanted to explore this relationship by humanizing the geese.  What if one goose tries to playfully sneak up on a dozing partner?

I thought the leaves were too big for this composition.  I don't know if this was a painting about leaves or geese.  I can't sense any goose/goose or geese/leaves relationship in this work.

What if I moved the geese closer to each other.  That will form a relationship for sure.

Well the leaves still stole the thunder.  They were too overpowering. One goose seemed  to be giving the other one a cold shoulder. There was too much size disparity between the 2 geese.  Was the sleeping one much farther back to have appeared  smaller?   If so, I need to perhaps paint it in a much lighter tone?  Or separate the two with blades of grass?  I really have not established the relationship of the 3 items in this painting at all.  Something to remember in my future trials.