Tag: Chinese

The August Project: Begun, Not Begun

I’ll use the excuse that I am warming up – so to speak – to my August project of copying the Heart Sutra.  After giving it some thought, I am still thinking about it.

I decided, as I thought, to simply dig out some ink and some brushes, and play a bit, loosen up.  Once I did so, I realized how stressed out about everything I’ve become.  Even this project, because perfection is what was on my mind, not enjoying a process.

I also was considering the reality that using the seal script might not work for me.  I did a bit of research on the seal script, and realized it would be possibly more frustrating than I wanted to handle.  The reason is that the lines are uniform, with none of the thick-and-thin and technical details, such as bone lines and dots, that kaisho would require.  So, for now, I have decided I will probably do it in the latter.

Playtime

In the process of playing, I started with lines.  Straight lines, horizontal, vertical, criss-crossed.  Circles and spirals.  Bone lines.  Dots.  I used bottled ink, and cheap, poorer quality ink sticks, and sheets of paper.  The results are like photography – lotsa photos, lotsa paintings – and only a few which are particularly pleasing.

Lines

In the line category, I wonder if it is just me, or if other people from the West experience the incredible difficulty I have with doing straight lines.  Both horizontal and vertical, parallel to the edge of the paper, are very difficult to produce.  My theory is that as someone who was taught the Palmer method of script, everything – but everything! – has a slant on it, except the t-bar.  Horizontal and vertical lines are very foreign.

In one book, one on the meditative approach to sumi, the author wrote about the importance of focusing on each line individually, not on the group of lines.  This proved to be the case.  As I began to paint grid after grid, the understanding of this concept became quite clear. Becoming the line as I was painting it is the simplest way I can explain the experience.

Circles / Enso

On the other hand, circles were a bit more easy, but doing them from the bottom of the` page and moving in a clockwise manner was a bit of a challenge.  My penmanship training was always start the number zero at the top, and create it by moving counterclockwise.  On a few pages, the paperweights did not hold, and so the paper got pulled along in the brush movement.

From circles and spirals, came a series of circles – some of which developed an incredible dynamic quality for me.

Bone Lines

Bone lines, used in kaisho, were especially difficult.  I watched videos from YouTube, simply to watch how the brush was manipulated.  Reading directions also created confusion.  Instructions in videos and in text books emphasize that the brush is held vertical to the paper.  To me, this means a 90 degree angle, perpendicular, not a tilt at all.  Then, watching, of course there is a tilt to the brush, but it is done through wrist manipulation.  Books say to keep the brush vertical, and then say “push the brush to the right” – well!  What does that mean??  I think I figured it out – some of my bone lines began to look like bone lines.

Dots

Finally, I could not just practice lines and circles.  I had to do something a bit different.  Yesterday I did dots – such as would be found with grapes – and various techniques with the brush.  Dots can be made by simply allowing the ink to be absorbed by the paper and spread, or by twirling the brush, to create a circle.

Brush Loading

Another technique is loading the brush in different ways.  In the picture below, you can see different methods.

In the picture above, there are three ways of loading the brush demonstrated.  The top one is the traditional light ink with the brush tipped in dark, and pulled at an angle across the paper.  The second one was an attempt to add dark ink to the top of the brush, near the handle, along with dipping it – this did not work out too well as I was stingy with the ink.  The third line, I was more generous, with both ink and water – the light middle line is visible to show the result.  Finally, the fourth line is the result of using a light wash for the brush, and then adding dark ink to the middle of the brush.  A rather nice effect.

Bouncing the Brush

I also practiced bouncing the brush, sort of tapping it and moving it along the paper.  The picture below demonstrates what can be done with this technique.

Copying the Master

Thoroughly warmed up now, I decided to see about copying a painting, using a video to copy and learn from techniques.  I admire the work of Kazu Shimura (see link to the right), who has over 70 videos on YouTube about sumi-e painting.  One I really enjoyed was his demonstration painting of hydrangeas.

Two totally different approaches to the same subject.  I went for the first one, and to do it with some rain.  These are my first attempts.  I did them from recall on what I saw, but I was not too pleased with my results.  Something was missing.

I did about 5 paintings altogether, but none of them worked.  So, I watched his first video again.  This time, my painting was far more pleasing than any of my other attempts.  Knowing full well I would fail at frogs, I did a snail.

And now?

It’s Friday, early evening.  I read a book today from the library – a rare treat – and then went out shopping for a computer desk.  I think tomorrow I am ready to begin the Heart Sutra.  It will be slow, maybe only one character, maybe a few more than that.  I think I will go page by page, as broken down on van Ghelue’s web page or from her book.  This past week I have spent about 20 hours painting in ink, and enjoying every minute!

An August Project

It has been crossing my mind for quite some time that I want to use ink and brush as a means to relax, focus, and ground myself. Traditionally, calligraphy has been one means to do this. For August, I decided I would attempt to do the Heart Sutra.  Nadja van Ghelue has a wonderful site, The Art of Calligraphy, about doing just this – as well as showcasing her own beautiful work – and has published a book with the Heart Sutra in seal script.  On her site, she also shows her work, and that of others, of the Heart Sutra in kaisho, as well as a section dedicated to writing the sutra as a form of meditation.

Van Ghelue is, in my opinion, a very accomplished calligrapher.  Her videos – 0nly three in number – show a lissome flow of brush work.  As you watch her, observe how her brush moves about the paper, up and down, a pause, pressure.  Her wrist remains straight with subtle movements to create the brushwork needed for a point, to turn a corner.  There is a gracefulness and serenity in her movements where other calligraphers may be more dynamic.

H.E. Davey is another accomplished calligrapher from the west.  He writes in his books, The Japanese Way of the Artist, and Brush Meditation:  A Japanese Way to Mind & Body Harmony, about Japanese calligraphy as a form of meditation.  Davey has been involved with Japanese cultural arts his entire life, and is currently the director of the Sennin Foundation Center for Japanese Cultural Arts in the San Francisco area.  Historically, bushido encompassed mastery in the arts beyond war.

Certainly, there are benefits to focusing on what one enjoys.  Expertise, finesse, internal, external, integration.  Artistry.  Joy.  Self expression.  Moving beyond present skills.  Expansion.  My own project is for meditative purposes, but it is also a journey into refinement of my own skills – an exploration of my own adventures in ink, brush, and line.

Painting Day, 03-13-2010

A Bit of Frustration

The other day I pulled out watercolors and paper – you saw the results in my last post.  Yesterday I spent most of the day painting. Suffice it to say that the watercolors were a total disaster – my impatience, as always, got in the way. Or, from another perspective, when it comes to watercolors, the paper is not absorbent like xuan, and as a result, I cannot be as spontaneous and as controlled with the brush at the same time. For me, I think my best results in watercolor come when I am far less impetuous, and thinking more graphically. Happy splattering never occurs for me with sized paper! So, after feeling frustrated (but still in a painting mood) I pulled out my large table of rice paper (12 x 18 inches) and a bottle of Japaneses sumi ink.

Moving from watercolor – wait, patience, think – I messed up a few sheets of the rice paper. My ink was not loaded into the brush, just solid black. My brush choice was poor. My attitude was pretty crappy after a disastrous watercolor experience, and it showed. Still, that energy also started to mellow out – I love the feel of ink and paint on absorbent paper! Finally, a few kinks worked out, I set about to using just the ink itself, and sometimes coupled it with the washes I’d made using my Pelikan pan paints.

Three Out of Four Gentlemen Show Up

To warm up, I used a large, soft brush and a finer, coarse hard brush. I did the plum. The large brush was loaded with a lot of light grey wash, and then the tips were slightly covered in dark black ink.

The next painting was the orchid. For this one I took out a large hard brush and loaded it with ink. This was for the leaves. I then used a medium choryu brush (soft on the outside with hard hair in the center) for the orchid flowers. I used the small hard brush for the orchid centers.

For the bamboo, I took the large, soft brush, again loaded with ink. I used it filled in different ways to get the four stalks. On one of the bamboo, I went in with just a solid wash, and came back later with a darker wash, doing thin strips down the left side. The joints in the bamboo stalks was done with the small, hard brush; I used this same brush for the bamboo leaves.

Palm Trees in Sumi-e

When I looked back over the logs for this blog, I realized with a bit of horror how much time has passed since I received a request for palm trees painted with sumi. I apologize for that, but unfortunately my life got too busy for such endeavors. So, here, at least are some palm trees.

I am not an expert in palm trees, so any mistakes here are my own as far as determining what kind of palm is what. Given that, let’s proceed.

The first thing I always notice about a palm tree is the trunk. Some are smooth, some rough. Coconut palm trees seem to be tall and smooth, with leafier, more graceful fronds. Date palms have thicker trunks with an obvious roughness where palm fronds have fallen off. The fronds tend to be stiffer and less flexible than those of the coconut palm. What they do have in common, though, is the way in which the serrated areas of the frond meet at the center. This gives a clear line in the middle which seems to have a space between it and the serrated areas. If you look at pictures of palm trees, you will see what I mean. To paint them means leaving that gap there, or using a very fine line to connect to it, and then using a steady sweep of the brush, much like you would do with an orchid leave. Pushing down on the brush – smooshing it – creates the wrong impression of the frond. However, you can turn the brush and create bent areas – palm fronds are pretty messy. A hard, dry brush is really good for expressing the ragged edges of some of the serrated “leaves” in the frond.

This is a palm frond, done first to consider how to do the structure of the frond itself. I used some of the colors from my pan paints as well, mixing it with different dilutions of ink.

This next one is from a picture of a coconut palm. The trunk was done with my choryu brush, loaded with a light and medium ink, and tipped in black. I laid the brush sideways, and did a quick stroke for the entire trunk. I then came in with the small, hard brush for the texture found at the base of the trunk and into the trunk itself. I used the choryu brush for the center lines of the fronds and for some of the paler frond leaves. I used my large, hard brush for the darker dry brush fronds. Before dipping it into the ink, I spread out the bristles, and then dipped only the ends into the ink, keeping the brush perpendicular to the ink. I painted the frond leaves the same way, using a quick flick while doing the best to avoid any pause on the paper. As the brush lost its load of ink, this became easier.

The next palm is a date palm. Its trunk is considerably coarser than that of the coconut palm, and its fronds are stiffer and messier. They were all over the ground around the palm tree in the photo I used as a reference. To paint the trunk I used dabs of medium ink, and then began using various loading combinations of light / medium / dark. I ended with the hard brush and undiluted dark ink. For the fronds, I used much the same approach as I did with the coconut palm, but worked to make sure I caught the more upright and clustered qualities of the fronds, as well as the shorter leaves along the frond itself.

Maple Trees with Chinese Paints

With all my washes from the watercolor painting excursion exhausted, but still in a mood to paint, I found a picture of some maple trees in Vermont, brilliant in their autumn foliage. I used the bottled sumi ink for the trunks, and then used yellow, orange, and red from my box of Marie’s Chinese colors. You can see how opaque they are in comparison to the Pelikan paints. I diluted the colors in some areas, mixed them together, smooshed them around. Other areas will show you the individual colors as dabs. Different layers from red-to-yellow can be found, as well as orange or yellow or red on top of everything else.

Altogether, I had a fun day painting. The best paintings are those done in sumi-e. I really like the palm trees and the frond, more so than the orchid, bamboo, or plum. The texture of the plum trunk was enjoyable to do, but the blossoms are too blotchy – you can see where the paint plopped down and spread. I must admit, too, that I find pictures I have done with Marie’s paints never satisfy me – the colors are too garish. I do know, though, that Teacher does lovely stuff with them, and when I work hard at it, I can produce paintings which appeal to me.

My own approach to sumi-e and Chinese painting is certainly influenced by being trained in Western art. I find my best connection is with sumi ink, brush, and paper, and feel it is closest to my own personality. Still, the mastery of watercolor is one of those lifetime goals, and for me, my best results are when I employ patience and thought, which is very different than immediate results of sumi painting.