MY SOAP BOX

Recently I had a chance to do a bit of Chinese Brush Painting demo at a trade show. The audience is obviously polite and enthusiastic, but the most frequent observation, before I started my demo, is that " Oh you do water color". In submitting work for juried events, the pigeon holes are whether you do acrylic, oil, mixed media or water color. Whereas these are the western ways of categorizing based on the medium one uses, the Chinese Brush Painting often separates the medium to water/ink or ink/color, and whether it's on Xuan or silk.  The ink and water plays off the intricacies of ink tones and the techniques in arriving at those tonal varieties. The terms splash ink, break ink, building ink are all techniques that we study, and appreciate and can be readily identified in an artwork.  Chinese have a saying that ink should have 5 colors.  Ink and color involves using both ink and color pigments.

Then we have the different genres of painting, i.e. figure, flower/bird, landscape. Within these categories, there is the distinction of Gongbi (precise, tidy style) and the Xieyi (brush strokes with expression) styles. The works that I do are all Xieyi style paintings.

I am not a "water color" artist and I am certainly not qualified to discuss water color techniques. But once "water color" is mentioned, then all the principals of western art applies, i.e. color wheel, light values, composition, "pigment sedimentation"?? comes into play. Whereas in my learning of painting with Chinese Brush, the craftsmanship, i.e. the use of the brush, assumes utmost importance. The characteristic of the lines, whether it is continuous, broken, moist, dry, straight tip, side tip, the different dotting techniques, and "chuen" techniques, all seem to play a more important role than what "medium" one works with. I am certainly not down playing the importance of the medium; after all, we do have a variety of pigments, papers, brushes for different thematic subject matters, and even different inks for painting or calligraphy.

I am using an analogy of comparing the same music played with different instruments. The melody is exactly the same, and most people do enjoy music, but it requires intimate knowledge of the musical instrument for one to truly appreciate the differences. If the listener knows nothing about string instruments, then techniques such as vibrato, pizzicato,harmonics would mean absolutely nothing. This person would not appreciate the need of playing with finger position vs. playing on an open string.

I am not trying to be a snob here, but for a person to appreciate Chinese Brush Painting as an art form, one should be equipped with discerning knowledge and not assumptions. If I might use music to illustrate my point again, there is a famous Chinese violin concerto with the title "Butterfly Lovers Violin Concerto" and obviously it was written for Violins. Well the same piece has been adapted for performance with Erhu, a Chinese two-stringed bowed instrument, and the effects are very different, albeit the same music. It is the instrument, Violin vs. Erhu, Chinese Brush vs. ??, that makes the difference, and to equate Chinese Brush Painting with water color is a mistake.

I fervently hope that for those of us who are new to Chinese Brush Painting would stop looking at the art form as "water color". It is about the calligraphic brush strokes and how to appreciate them, and not about tribalism as some might counter.

Okay, I feel much better now.

SPEED BOAT

I showed how I laid the ground work for this painting using my Secret Ancient Chinese solution, to establish the wave crests, followed by meticulous filling in with different ink tones to construct the "waves". Then I painted in the boat and the human figures. Before I go too far with this, I must first declare that this is not an original composition. I was trying to emulate the work of another artist and I have stated that with the labeling on the painting itself. What I was trying to explore was to employ my own method to create my style of "wave" effect. A few more flicks of the Secret Solution to the left, and then painted in the boulders and by george, if the water wasn't pounding on them rocks!!!!

In the process of painting in the waves and having the crests show, I rendered too dark a color. This gave the painting a nasty, fierce look but I would have preferred a lighter tone.

After looking at it for a week or so, I decided that the only first aid I could administer was to add a little bright color to the painting. I made the front and back person wore red hats, as if they were the guides and the middle couple were the passengers.

I must say this was a fun project..............

When I have time I would try this one again, with a lighter tone, and different figures.......

Toying with Ancient Chinese Secret Solution

Ever since I had some success with my Ancient Chinese Secret Formula ( refer to my blog on "SPLASH"), I've been itching to embark on another project using the same technique.

I found the work of a contemporary Chinese artist and I liked the way he represented a boat slipping through white waters so I decided to emulate his painting.

I am faced with the challenge that what I am doing is Xieyi, the painting style where expression and ambiance assumes utmost importance. My downfall is that often I am so caught up in details that I lose sight of the big picture. So how do I re-create this energy of white waters amidst all the intricacies of painting waves.

I know I wanted to use my alum solution for the white, foamy part of the churning water, so I started out by positioning the boat on my paper, and penciling in the crests of the waves.

The reason I had to pencil in the highlights is that once this solution dries, I don't know which spots I have laid the elixir, so it would be very difficult for me to draw a cohesive painting. I also mixed some salad dressing with my secret solution to give it a thicker consistency, so that it is more visible.

All this time I am taking extra precaution to be not too cautious!! What an oxymoron !!!!!!

I don't want the water to look or feel static and stagnant. I want it to come alive!

I now wet the entire paper with light ink solution. The areas where I laid the secret solution now shows up as white greasy marks. This is almost like working in darkroom in photography, to see the image emerging from your developer. Here is an exercise in patience and creativity....... to define the outlines and the shapes of the white waters.

My solution laden spots did not show up prominently enough so I decided to augment them by laying on more layers of that solution. I raised my paper against the light so I can see those bare spots better, and I went to work on adding extra layers of this solution to those areas.

Now that I have the white foamy crests down, I need to darken the surrounding areas to create the contrast. I am having problem visualising the "structure" of these crests. I know I can treat them like rows of hills, as if I was doing Xieyi landscape painting. So leave the ridge bright, "chuen" the rest, and shade the valleys..... piece of cake. Alas, I have never seen so many little hills undulating and moving in front of me........ it couldn't be the Syrah that I am drinking, could it? Information overload, my hard drive hangs!

One Person One Stroke Finished Product

Ta Daaaaaaaa Here's the finished painting.

It is safe to say that every one of us had a Great time and new gained confidence.

We learned that we need to go over the painting many times, and that it is an evolving process. We were faced with a "boo boo" when the left support of the bridge was deemed out of scale and had the wrong orientation.

What did we do? We extended the foliage to cover the "boo boo" and this is a hands-on experience that is invaluable.

We retained the original title of the painting, but in place of the poem that was on the original work, we had everybody sign their names.

The following link lets you see some of the highlights of the event

http://gallery.me.com/akwan#100012

Rice Fields finished product ?

Received word from Portland Open Studios that I am " IN " this year, suffice to say, I am elated. Went through my pile of paper on the floor, picking projects that are half done and see which one might have potentials to be Open Studios material.



Back to the Rice Fields again. Like any good Chinese Brush Painting student, I finished composing my work, did the necessary "chuen", laid down my shading with light ink etc. We were taught that coloring does not make your painting "better", it merely brings into life what we have laid down on paper. In other words, everything needs to be finished first, and coloring is the last step.

After several layers of colors and washing, I ended up with the painting on top. I must say that I did not like it at all. I have tried to soften the roofs by applying a dark plum color to it, using side tip brushing. This did make the roofs less "harsh", less "rigid", but the entire housing compound seemed totally detached from the painting. It lacked "connection", it did not belong. I looked like an island in the sea. The trees and shrubs/woods at the bottom of the painting look like two flat ribbons. The rigid lines at the lower left corner of the housing compound looked out of place, and wanted to lead you away from the painting; a most uncomfortable feeling. Perhaps the corner is too harsh?

I let the painting dry and looked at it for a whole afternoon, thinking. Trying to understand what I have put down on paper. It finally dawned on me that I was too busy recording, and forgot about creating.

I started to back lit the trees, because light is coming from behind the paper.

I high lighted the shrubs and trees into distinct clumps to add dimension and shape to the "flat ribbons". I re dotted the dark areas with ink and dark plum ( I love using dark plum color; it helps to transition between dark and light areas ) to make the high lights work. All of a sudden the foreground looked a lot more interesting. The void on the lower edge of the painting was meant to be just voids, because I did not apply color there. But because of the color

bleed from applying the dark plum and green pigments, the bottom "void" took on a feel of a glassy surface of a pond. So I added a reflection of the tree on the right, to make it look like a pond.

This was a happy coincidence. The pond was not in my original thoughts. It just happened, and I think it added a lot to the painting. Now I have a foreground, the edge of the pond, then the commune, then the fields, then the distant hills, then the smoggy skies. All of a sudden, everything seemed "connected" I also softened the lower left "corner" by adding a couple of trees on site and by laying down reflections of the houses on the flooded fields. I also darkened the lower fields and gave the entire painting a green wash to integrate the colors.

Doesn't the painting look a lot better now?

Rice Fields

Bought some new paper lately, Korean Hemp Paper and I've been itching to try this out.

The paper is very unlike the Xuan paper in that it behaves almost like sized paper. Has a waxy feel to it and does not absorb water readily. I found that out when I splash some brush washing water on the paper ( my bad habit) and I was able to blot it up.

I wanted to paint the rice fields in China, flooded with water and surrounded by columnous hills that are quite characteristic of the southwestern part of China and Vietnam. I also had photos as references for this endeavour.


The composition is not your typical Chinese painting with the scattered focal points. My painting here has a vanishing point, definitely speaks of the western genre. I wanted to have a play of light values, by showing the reflections of the distant hills in the flooded rice fields, such that the massive fields behaves almost like water surface. I wanted the geometric array of roofs of the village commune to be contrasting with the strange looking hills in the background.

I painted the distant hills with wet wash, and when they are almost dry, I went over the contour with darker ink. The ink diffuses out and gives one the effect of vegetation. If I was to add silhouettes of trees etc on the hills, they would look too deliberate, and takes away the Xieyi feel of the painting. The fatal mistake I made in this painting is that I was " filling in " the roofs with concentrated ink, almost like painting by the numbers. Whereas this looks neat an tidy, but is totally devoid of any artistic feel to it. This is what happens when we use a 2 dimensional photograph as reference. Somehow we still need to portray a 3 dimensional look. I've often talk to other beginners about the shortcomings of looking too closely at a photograph, and this is a good example of what NOT TO DO. We need to be able to digest the image and translate into our own interpretation.

Two Ancient Pieces

I took one of my finished works to Hong Kong for mounting. Our local craftsman here lack the skill in silk mounting. Just got this back in the mail and I was so excited that I had to post this right away. Showed a head shot to reveal the size of this painting.



This piece of work is suppose to emulate the old classic style of Chinese Brush painting. The emphasis is with the lines, with scant use of color. My theory is that in the old days, illumination


is not great in a typical Chinese dwelling, even during daytime. So color scheme is simple and sparingly used. Artists showed their craft by displaying superb line qualities. Moist vs. dry, side tip, straight tip, fleeting strokes and hesitations are all used in a harmonious way to illustrate the aesthetic qualities of the painting. The "chuen" ( rubbing technique) is typically the "hemp" style, i.e. ala hemp fibres.

The land masses on the left has totally different characteristics from the right. The left is of multi-lobed hills, so the " hemp chuen" is used to define the quality of the slopes, the convolutions of the hills. The "hemp chuen" gives a rounded, definitely not jagged feel to the land features. The right hand side speaks of drama. Bold, protruding granites form the main features. Here the "chuen" is more of the "axe" type. Bold, discrete side-tips with lifts to give the harsh texture. Of course shading adds to the strong 3-D feel of features to the entire land mass.



The left and right is joined by a transitional spit, via a bridge. The willows on the spit bends to the right, answering to the left bending willows on the right side of the painting. Water space is left blank, with a very faint hint of the same brown color of the hills (integrating the overall color scheme of the painting)



This painting failed in the sense that the color was too heavy and too bright. I would have preferred a more subdued hue, especially that awful green with the willows. The mountain streams should be left with just a hint of color. The plateau on the left, behind the ridges is showing the wrong perspective..... showing too much of the top. The shore line on the right scurries upwards instead of staying at horizontal...... I must be tired.



Well, these are areas that I need to correct, if I have to redo this painting. I actually have sized another length of paper and I wanted to paint this again on sized paper, to see if the sized paper would give the painting a less saturated look, therefore coming closer to the "antique" feel of the painting.