7 Years Ago, 2005

Last week I hopped onto a plane and traversed 1000 miles to go back to my birthplace, Hong Kong.  My mom will be 90 this month.  I am going to wish her Happy Birthday in person.

What kind of gifts should I bear.  My family is not big into this tradition at all.  In fact, we are not into celebrating birthdays at all.  I need to show my thoughtfulness and affection without any materialistic overtones.  Why not paint her something.  This grand idea hit me the week before my departure.
The painting I wanted to write for her is one by Bai Xueshi, a contemporary landscape painter.  I have used his work for my collaborative painting post on 4/22/10.  In fact I have used this piece of work as an example ( similar to using tie in calligraphy ) just recently.  With a goal in mind, a deadline to beat, a painting to emulate,  and adrenalin flowing free, I forged ahead.

The premise of the painting is really simple.  The painting is seemingly split into two halves by the water line, contrasted with elements of "sparse" on the right and "dense" on the left.  The two fishermen on bamboo rafts are thus framed, being highlighted by the void space.

What I have done differently this time is to write the bamboo first.  I then filled in the mountain pillars and their reflections.  The rafts take up the last act.  I learned this sequence the hard way.  What I had done in the recent past was to paint the landscape first.  The coloring actually sized the Xuan paper.  By the time I was ready to lay down the bamboo the paper is no longer as absorbent and the ink ended up just sitting on the paper.  This affected the brush strokes and raised my anxiety level quite a bit.

The above picture showed finished landscape, without the rafts and script.

This picture showed a "failed" painting, not only in terms of the qualities of the brush strokes, but also in the lack of control of ink bleeding.

Here are the 2 attempts pictured side by side.  My mom received the one on the right.  This is the one where the bamboo was done first. There is a far better control of shading and diffusing of the ink to show dense clusters of leaves.  The clear brush marks on the reflections of the mountains left no doubt about using splash ink side tip technique.  The treatment of the outside borders of the mountain added complexity to an otherwise plain splash ink stroke.  The darker center pillar brought itself front and center and pushed back the other pillars to create depth.  The faint and yet distinct water line separated the land mass from the water and created a virtual shoreline.  As a whole I am pleased with my efforts this time, except for my calligraphy.

What made this painting especially meaningful for me, and for my mom is that back in May of 2005 when I visited her, I was just starting to study Chinese Xieyi landscape.  I chanced upon this painting and I unabashedly painted for her.  My mom was (is) so proud of this that she scotch-taped it to the wall of the living room and would tell any visitor who cared to listen that "My son did this".

I did my "good" painting this time in the Xuan-Boo fashion, mounted on canvas and protected from the Hong Kong humidity by Golden gel medium.  It is obviously interesting to make a comparison of
my works, 7 years apart, almost to the date.  The important thing is, mom likes them both; because I did them.

Don't Throw The Baby Out With The Bath Water

Sometimes ( actually more frequently than I wished ) I am faced with the dilemma of what to do with a bad painting that has a bright spot or two.  What do I do with a Delicious Apple that shows scab on one side?  It would be such a waste to throw out the whole fruit.

My solution to my dilemma is cropping.  Since I mount my work on custom frames, I am not bound by any conventional dimensions.  I need not be concerned about having to meet certain predetermined sizes.   So if surgery is called for, surgery it will get.

I  made a couple of  L-shaped borders out of foam boards.  These borders can now be placed over the work in question and I can move them about to see if any part of the otherwise bad painting could be saved. 

Attempts at charcoal

Since I acquired charcoal for my geese project, I wanted to see what I could do with it.  Charcoal is interesting to me mainly because of its inherent black and white contrast and all the values in between.
My interest in the black and white medium dates back to my high school days when black and white photographs were a lot cheaper to process.  On top of that my high school had a dark room.  It was a great excuse to get into an air-conditioned room when the outside is hovering around 90 degrees and 99 per cent humidity. 

The first attempt was a self portrait.  I did this standing in front of the mirror in the bathroom.  My acquaintances told me that it didn't look like me, since I look much better than that; nonetheless I captured that sour frown on my face as I was so absorbed in my own portrayal.  I almost look like Donald Trump !

My second attempt was a flight of steps.  I was mesmerized by the contrast not only of the light values, but of the rounded, curve lines against the rectangular brick works.

Should My Paintings Be Explained ?

I went to an exhibition of  a relief print artist. 

The images were all haunting.  They told stories of  roaches and leeches coming out of  body orifices.
Behemoth rising from the cracks of the earth.  Mythological  beings in acrobatic convolutions.  They struck me as schizophrenic.

My artist friend who is well versed in print making was appreciative of the techniques, the composition and color choices, and was intensely curious as to the meaning of these works.  Inevitably our conversion evolved to whether our works need any explanation?

Painting for me is a form of self expression.  I am using my brush and paper as my tools of communication.    As I utter my words this way,  I am shielded, in most cases, from face to face contact.  I get to verbalize in my privacy, and the viewers do their viewing in theirs.  This added insulation allows me the opportunity to disclose what I would otherwise be reluctant to.  Therefore artists perhaps feel protected, or at least are more willing, to portray troubling, perhaps even socially unacceptable thoughts????

I can't help but be reminded of a movie that I saw, "NEVER LET ME GO".  In this movie a lover couple thought that their love for each other could be substantiated by the guy's art work.  If they can prove there existed true love between them, then they could find a way out of their predicament.  So they went to the gallery curator and asked for affirmation, only to be told that they couldn't be extracted from their fate.   However, what the curator said was even beyond what they were seeking.  What was said was (paraphrasing) " we don't want to reveal your souls, we want to see if you have souls"

For my very limited exhibition experiences, I've always attached  a description to each piece of work.  Sometimes documenting my techniques, but more often, my thoughts.  Some of the  artists that I've encountered really frowned on this idea.  To them, any explanation is a desecration of their work, or that such explanation limits the viewer's imagination and therefore sets unnecessary boundaries and preconceptions.  So what happens when we assign a title to a piece?  Aren't we guilty of suggesting?  If one is true to this belief, then all works should be labelled as "Untitled".

For my piece "Lonely", people would recognize that as a dark painting.  Perhaps the silhouetted images  elicited an accord with viewers.  Need I tell you what my thoughts were?

I had the following write up on my description.  Hints of blue adds to bleakness of a cold, moon lit night.  Birds have settled in for the night, silhouetted against the emptiness as a lone wolf  howls to the moon, begging for company.  Did that help to paint a more succinct picture?  Did I barge in on your elucidation?


For my blog on "PAIN" I alluded to the circumstances of creating this painting.  Certainly the title of "PAIN" helps to channel the viewer to that particular frequency.  But now read the captions that I had placed on the label of this painting and feel the painting again.

PAIN
Is drinking by yourself
Is to be alone in a crowd
Is voices
Is faces
Is inexplicable
Is not able
To find me.

Was my explanation adding to or taking away from your impression ?   From my perspective, as the person who created these pieces, I do relish the idea that my viewers and I are on the same page sharing the same emotions.  I, for one, would not scoff at the idea of explaining my works.

Of course this becomes a moot point if we practice the 3 Perfections  of  Chinese Brush Painting, i.e. the painting, an accompanying poem  and the calligraphy of the poem.

More Than Just Broken Lines

I touched upon the topic of continuous lines (contour) in my last blog.  I wanted to discuss the curse of a continuous line in Chinese Brush painting, especially when spatial accounting is necessary or preferred.

We often hear brush artists mention that continuous lines suffocate;  that the painting  "can't breathe".  In my "Don't Cross Me" blog I talked about how to remedy lines that intersect.  Intersecting lines take away the spatial arrangement of our painted subjects.  Continuous lines tend to foul in the same manner, burying the presence of any third dimension.    Demand for such reveal is critical, for example in landscape paintings.

In the following illustration, the letter E written with continuous lines look flat.  Two dimensional.
The adjacent E was written with broken lines, strategically placed, and now assumes a three dimensional feel.

In the next illustration, the far left image shows 2 overlapping circles with no spatial definition.
The middle image clearly shows which circle is on top, whereas the image on the right adds a dimension of depth to our visual clues.  The gap between the 2 circles creates a thickness.  We are more apt to perceive these 2 circles as the top and bottom of a cylinder.  The "gap" technique is evidenced by the separation of ridge contour lines by space disguised as cloud or mist, thus pushing back the ridge tops in succession, creating perspective.

Finally I have an illustration of 4 circles, analogous to the 4 geese I was trying to paint in my last blog.

The right image on top row does clearly denote which circle is covering which, but the image on the second row has a strong suggestion of depth;  all because of the broken lines.  This image can "breathe"!

When I was painting the geese, I was so hung up on the blank bodies and fuzzy outlines that I had totally forgotten about the basic premise of rendering lines in Chinese Brushwork, and more specifically, how to render depth and relationship between subject matters by just paying attention to writing lines.

To break or not to break, that is the question.

Have I Cooked My Geese ?

Having tried my hands at modeling my geese as animate objects, I wanted to present them in a more impressionistic light.

My initial impression was obviously to play up the black and white content of my subject matters, but I wanted to treat the bodies of the geese as my void spaces.  Therefore the background needed to be dark to reveal the bodies.

As I looked at the first draft, I immediately felt that the painting was TMI, too much information.  It is true that the strokes were haphazardly written, as I was formulating the construction as it was evolving,  nonetheless the only "impression" I perceived was "garbage".

My vision had gotten a little clearer.  I would like to frame my subjects in

a. A dark background
b. A white body
c. A distinct black and white neck
d. A fuzzy, ink bled lines of the body contour to suggest down feathers

These geese would be sleeping with their heads tucked back.  My premise was that I would have a contrast of a few teardrop bodies vs one such body, the Su (sparse) and Mi(crowded) contrast, and that the necks would be tucked in opposing directions for balance.

Notice that I added blue tint to the contour line to add a little flavor.

Working off this basic blueprint, I tried on a less heavy costume.  My background became a much smaller patch of gray, but I used pencil marks to accentuate the geometric forms of geese with their heads tucked back.  A more minimalistic view.

And I also tried different arrangements, with the bodies painted in.

I was not too thrilled with the results up to this point.  I blamed it on my brush techniques, and a lack of control of my ink bleed.  Being a resourceful person, I tried the unthinkable.

A quick trip to the local art supply, I armed myself with a charcoal pencil and a bunch of charcoal sticks.  For the next couple of weeks, I fretted about how I was going to proceed.  Finally it came.

I did everything ( save the neck  ) with charcoal.  The necks were done with brush and ink and the contour lines was gone over with a moist ink brush to fill in the gray and was allowed to bleed a little. 


The painting was interesting.  That was a polite way of saying  " ah, not that good ".  I would have like the lines to be quite a bit  fuzzier to animate down feathers.  Unfortunately that wasn't the only problem that ailed this painting.  This piece assumed too much of a "graphic" look.  The worst part was that all the contour lines were continuous and unchanging, a big no no in Chinese brush painting, where Bi-Fa is all important. ( I'll delve more into "continuous lines" in my next blog).  I tried to break up these chained lines by darkening the necks and the lower bodies such that a break was more noticeable in the continuum of patches. 

Well that didn't work so well.  Back to the drawing board.

That was my last attempt at my impressionistic geese.   I need to sleep on this for a while and see what happens.  I can't feel anymore.  I just hope that I haven't cooked my geese.

Beyond The Horizon

Having laid down a few of the flight postures of the Canada Geese, it is time to mate them to different backgrounds.

The first concept I wanted to explore was the natural habitat of these migrants; the wetlands. 

I did not want to paint blades of reed grass, nor did I want to do reflections on water.  Especially the water, I thought it was passe and run of the mill.  Besides, it did not fit well with the soaring birds.

I decided on doing a bunch of nondescript vertical strokes as the vegetations in the wetlands.   I tried to avoid packing the strokes too tightly together.  I made sure that I had voids amongst my strokes for "breathing".   Alum solution was used to paint the initial few strokes.  This worked as a resist and altered the absorbency of the Xuan.  Subsequent overlays of colored strokes would reveal voids occupied by the initial alum brush strokes.

I also used a rather stiff horse hair brush to facilitate the texture.  I kept the color light and not saturated to contrast with the dark birds.  I wanted to really separate the geese from the background to give the illusion that they really are airborne.

What ended up was a  painting with a horizon dividing the Xuan into 2 equal parts.   I suppose my replay of the wetland horizon was so overwhelming that I committed the cardinal sin of  halving my Xuan.

My color scheme for the ground reference was on the light side, so the halving was not real obvious.  Unfortunately once I noticed it I could not take my eyes off of that.  Reminded me of the time a lady sat across from me on the subway with a big boil on her exposed neckline.  I knew I shouldn't be staring.  Yet the harder I tried to not look at it, the more I ended up looking at it.

So how could I remedy this?

It was suggested maybe I could paint a tree to breakup the horizon.  I didn't like it because it took away the sense of free flight.  Somehow the geese seemed to be tethered to the tree.

Another suggestion would be to perhaps add other points of focus/interest to breakup the symmetry.  In this case, bright colored dots sprinkled strategically on the ground reference could divert ones attention to the dividing line in the middle.  This is the same theory behind the application of "moss" dots commonly employed in the floral or landscape genres.

I tried to accentuate certain parts of the grassy foreground to add layers to the composition, and to allow the sloped contour of these layers to dilute the effects of the bisecting horizon.

(The correction is still wet, thus effects are exaggerated)

(Same painting after correction, when dried)

Of course the simplest way to deal with this problem is to crop the painting such that the horizon no longer occupies  the mid-line.