The Chinese brush painting of Kuan Chung is direct, economic, and poetic. In a few
strokes he creates a universe on paper, a few strokes that emerge from a lifetime
of patient practice and centuries of tradition. Born in a small village of
only four homes in southern China, Kuan eventually studied in Hong Kong. There he
met his wife. In 1964 Kuan and his family came to San Diego to join his father in
the family business. Kuan continued his painting regimen at every opportunity,
gradually gaining the confidence and the skill required to be recognized as a
master teacher of Chinese landscape, portrait, and brush painting. Although
Kuan has survived political upheaval and loss, he considers himself to be very
lucky. He has achieved membership in the National Academy of Design. His family is
healthy and happy and he loves his beautiful adopted city of San Diego,
California. In this video workshop you will sit in the front row as Kuan
introduces you to the materials in brush painting, rice paper, brushes, and ink. He
then will demonstrate six traditional brush paintings. The first of two prawns
will demonstrate the ten classic brushstrokes used in brush painting. Next
his lyrical swallowbirds and two bamboo paintings, one in calm weather and the
other in wind, and a serene hibiscus painting, and finally a painting of two
classic horses and a cowboy. Now let's join Kuan Zhong as he demonstrates the
art of Chinese brush painting.
Hi everybody. Welcome to this Chinese brush workshop. My name is Kuan Zhong and
I'm going to talk about Chinese brush painting.
Chinese brush painting is actually drawing by bamboo brush. It is related to
Chinese calligraphies. There are several styles of Chinese writings. These
characters are paintings. The first one is the old text writing and then they
change to another one through time and then change to something else. Although
they look different, they mean the same. Another example here is the word wing.
Wing means last a long time. Here's the old writing and more later on they use
this one. And nowadays we're using this variation of brush and this one is the
casual running style. It means the same thing but the writing is different. Why
they are so much changing? When paper was invented and the people in China
write characters, then time people changing their writing habits. Paper
function with the brush and in a different way. There are quite a few of
tool equipment we use for brush painting. First we talk about the brush. We use for
brush painting the bamboo brush made of animal hair. Some are harder than others,
some are softer. The most commonly used is the sheep hair. The white one like this.
Those are the sheep hair. They are really soft. They have lots of hair in there and
they can pick up lots of water. Another type of disable hair, properly make of
horse hair or wolf hairs. All those little bit stronger hair. We use this type of
brush to paint detail works like all bow brushwork stroke. Most of these
use for the bamboo painting but for most of the professional painter they
would prefer this type of brush. I have this one for the brush. To rest the brush
on after you paint we have ink to use. Ink grinders, ink sticks, liquid inks and
even black inks with acrylic paint and all those color paint and this one is to
mix the color with dishes we use when we are painting. Those are the dishes to
store colors after we use. This one is to wash the brush frequently. When we do
painting we have to wash all the time. Ink stone with grinder pestle. The ink
come with like a stick so you can keep the ink and store it for a long time
when you want to use it. Break it out and put some water into the ink stone and
use this ink stick round and round and grind out the ink with the stick. There's
also an easy way to do this without doing this hard work by using liquid ink.
Liquid ink is available now in the market but for the consistency of the ink
sometimes we do need a lot more work to work it out to a certain consistency.
Another way is to use black ink from acrylic paint or other water soluble ink.
Just put some of the from the tube and then mix it with the liquid ink to get
the consistencies for your painting. Here's how to do this with a brush and
then dilute the acrylic paint into the bowl. That will give you the consistency of ink to work with.
Ink sticks come in all shapes. It's a very decorative and art in itself. This one
come in a square form. It come in all kind of design, symbolic. Most frequently
people would use is one like this, the round one, it looks like a stick.
The paper we use should be absorbent, translucent and without any hard edge effect.
You can see all the brush later on. That is a good paper. Now the most company
use bright paper but actually they are not made of bright. They would make of something else.
There's one in the market in China popular for brush painting. It's called
Xuan paper. The Xuan paper here I would like to show you. The first one is one price Xuan paper.
The one price is very thin and it's for the professional use. Those not so easy to control.
The water would run very easily because of only one layer of paper. The second one is
two price Xuan paper. It's thicker for the brush. It holds water more steadily and it also records
all the brush work. You can work on it slowly and it's very good for brush work. Also very close to the
Chinese Xuan paper come in a book like a patch of rice paper. Come from Japan and a little bit
different is they are not so absorbent. They are a lot smoother in a different texture. This one is
a thin one and this one is thicker one. When selecting paper maybe best way is to put some
water on it and see how it runs. It has no hard edge in it. It would be a good paper. Another type of
paper is make of the texture of the bark. Linen is thin. You see it's how thin it is.
After painting this paper needs mounting right away. So to keep the painting in there or you can mount it before you paint.
This one is essential.
A roll of paper towel. Now how you going to wipe up your brush? Excess water.
Pull the brush you have a very fine point. Another very useful tool is the wool cloth.
You see how smooth it is. The wool cloth is better than a piece of paper.
It also helps you to lay the paper on a flat surface. The wool actually support the paper in a
flat position. At the final stage of a brush painting one would put his signature on and then
the stamp of course. The seal or the chop. The chop is make of a soup stone.
Soup stone is soft. Buy this in the Chinese book store. A soup stone without any carving on it.
Design your own seal and carve with any wood carving knife. As another tool we need is
this silk ink. Usually come in red colors. You will find it in art supplies.
The function dictate the way we hold the brush. This is the traditional way of
writing holding a brush. Three fingers holding it really tight. Press it really tight with the thumb
against the middle index fingers. Then use the ring finger. Use this ring finger to move the brush.
Draw close to the table. When we draw detail work this holding way is essential.
The rest to put on the table that station it and then moving the ring finger to draw or to write.
This is one way of holding it type of holding I call it lock in hold. Lock in hold. Another type of
holding is the three finger hold. It would be holding a little bit longer from the tape.
This type of holding we use the whole brush to draw bigger subject matter.
While we standing up and the elbows lift it up. Bigger brush work that requires us to hold the
brush in a longer state. At the end of the bamboo brush I call it the three finger hold.
Three finger hold would draw these long lines on this script painting because it requires
you stand up and draw long strokes. The orchid is definitely using the three finger hold.
And the more detailed work like the chrysanthemum had required the brush to draw the outline of it.
It's a more detailed work. I use this lock in hold.
This plant painting consists of 10 different strokes. Here is the rice paper,
swan paper, two ply layers. Cut it for the size with water of the folder paper and then cut it.
Just tear it down when you wet it. Now the first thing we do is to get the tone of the ink.
A little bit ink here from the wheel, add a lot of water. So the medium size well. I want to use a
little bit cobalt blue at the paintings. So the brush work would be mixed. Blue makes a little bit
ink and after that we can paint the prawn with some kind of blue tone colors.
Now line up the brush on the paper so you get a fine line. Same thing.
You should line it up. We use three brush strokes. One is the center one and then
two from each side to form the head part.
And then we draw the body of the prawn with different type of brush. It's like a curve.
I have moon. One parallel to each other.
I take here a different type of brush work. It plays down in three directions.
And number four is the short whiskers. We're looking for something right here by pulling
the brush. It's the same brush. Irregular pulling. Small feet. It's like a commerce.
The brush will like a commerce. See? That's the fit of the prawn.
The claw like two sharp V-shape claw here. One and two. Then the arm would be three
sticks. Rampel sticks like. See?
And we pick the other hand or claw. We have one V-shape claw and arm.
Then we draw the long whiskers. Another one by pulling is something like this.
After that, we need the hair we aim to draw the plane of the prawn and the eye of the prawn.
In order to register the hair we aim brush work, we have to do something about this because we just
painted it. It's wet. It might spread too much. I use a piece of paper towel to cover the head
and move the fingers to soak up some of the water. Use pure ink. Make the reverse stroke.
Act like this. One, two. One, two. Up. And then the eye.
And then the eye.
We can paint another one. The first and the body.
And the tail.
The whiskers.
And the feet.
The tail. And has a claw.
And repeat that.
And the long whiskers.
And maybe the hair we aim is not thick enough so I use some of this acrylic paint to make it
just really pure black.
And the tail. That's how two prawns are made.
Now all we do is to balance it to figure it out where to put the signature and the seal.
I would put it right here because I'm away from the center of interest. I put my name
and using black ink hole and place it really down on the table and right on it.
That's it.
In the right direction.
That concludes a painting of prawn.
Now this lesson is swallow burr. This burr requires only two tones of ink.
The real black one and a little bit of the end. By pressing down and lift the action
the action will create a burr head right there.
And then the wing.
And another wing.
And let's say we put it on this side and then the tail and the same action really.
So we created a swallow burr all in a very short stroke.
Press down and lift up fast. Next step we do a little line drawing. We line up the brush,
have a fine point by lower down the finger and draw the peak of the burr and the body.
And there we go.
Then we put really heavy ink back to draw the eye.
So here you go the burr is done. Swallow to have a red shirt sometime.
All right now let's do that. I'll find some red color right here.
Put it in the dish.
The water.
And here come the red shirt. A little pressing down action to do it.
The first burr is done.
We're going to repeat some of the burrs. Press it down and draw the wing.
And the tail.
Fresh stroke.
And we draw the peak of the burr and the body.
So and a little tased shirt.
Then we put the eyes in.
See we have two burrs. In the spring flowers coming out everywhere accompany the burr.
We can do that right here. Use a slanting brush to treat the burr and then draw.
To a signal like a branch.
And add a little bit action. Strange with a little dot here.
Orange color to depict the flower we have.
And put the flowers somewhere.
And something about the flower so it can stick with the branch.
We need some leaves.
Young leaf is kind of yellow and green mixed together. So there we go.
That's about enough I think.
So we add a little bit black color to the leaves to make it strong.
To outline the wind in the leaf.
That's outline.
Where to put the signature is the final balancing the penature.
So we look directly see the flow right back and I would put it right here.
So it won't take a long time to make a glasswork painting.
Actually there we go the seal for this painting.
And we have a painting made.
Now we are doing a bamboo tree from the leaves.
Remember that we are drawing triangle.
As triangle formation.
Triangle.
So this would be the major center of interest.
Then we go to the tree trunk.
So we start from here and drawing up.
Going up and then we connect it with the branches and the knot.
That's supposed to the knot and the branches will go up like this.
So make another triangle somewhere.
I probably pick up the wrong brush but there we go.
The dispersion part.
Okay we add a little bit as the dispersion.
First this tree trunk and then the leaves and then the leaves.
That's the dispersion part.
Now.
There we go.
Now is the signature and the seal.
We put bamboo leaves in one direction only.
It signifies the wind's blowing this way.
And then we have a bamboo stick or tree trunk going from this direction.
And a little bit free knot going.
And
then
I think it would do the trick now.
Now by this leaf we can tell the wind is blowing.
So it's kind of a join in type.
Not enough for the center interest maybe.
So I put it right here.
And the seals go in to balance the painting.
That's one.
We're gonna do a hibiscus.
We're gonna do a red one with lots of watercolors.
So here we go.
A pressing stroke like that.
And then with less.
With less.
So what I would do is to pick up some of the water in the set.
So here we go.
The second one.
And less.
And even less.
We're gonna simply wash off for the last two flower petals.
Now the next one will be a little bit different colors.
I pick this one.
Orange colors one with some of the red colors to mix it for the first petals.
Like this.
That's one.
And pick up some of the colors.
And then we're gonna do the same thing.
Like this. That's one. And pick up some of the colors.
And for the second one.
And the third one.
So wash off the brush for some of the colors.
And make the fourth and the fifth.
So try to make it, every one a little bit different.
Now first off, I will use the real red one.
If the red color is not heavy enough, I would add a little bit of ink on it.
So to make it darker, to make this flower filament.
By using a close to the table vertical stroke.
Every verse one.
Like that.
First this direction.
And the neck.
Back.
So it will come out like this.
This size bigger.
Smaller.
So add a little bit more on the filament on the top.
Maybe five.
I wash the brush again.
To pick up some yellow colors.
To make some dots.
Make sure the water is being soaked away from the towel.
And here is the yellow.
Lemon yellow.
And we'll make some of the dots here.
Sparkle the flower filament.
We will put some red color on the flower filament.
On the flower petals.
By drawing lines.
Like that.
Like a friendship.
And a friendship.
Same goes with this.
The filament stops right here.
Maybe we should add some here.
Make a fine line.
A fine drawing helps to make a point of the brush.
That needs lots of pulling.
Now we're going to finish this petal drawing pretty soon.
After the flower, the branch.
Pick up some of the pigment, the brown pigment.
Drawing from this side to that side.
Maybe I get a little bit slanting brush.
And then pull.
I will leave some areas empty.
So I will add the leaves later to fill up the empty space.
That's how we do it.
Now wash my brush again.
And fill the brush with the leaf colors.
Would be blue, yellow.
Mix it.
A very casual way of doing it.
Slanting brush or vertical brush.
Here come some of the leaves.
Pick up the water and the blue color.
Slanting brush, vertical brush.
It's in a casual way.
Water again.
Make it a lot of water.
We put some ink color underneath.
And here and there.
And I start to outline the leaves with the vein a little bit.
To make sure that the brush is dry enough.
Dry enough.
Just keep doing this until all the leaves are finished.
And we will do something else for this painting.
Okay, that's the part.
Maybe we will do something else to as a dispersed element.
And slanting brush.
Just draw some textures.
After the texture is drawn, then we will draw lines of a rock.
We will say the rock will face this way and the light will come this way.
And we have a rock.
And add a few dots.
I'm suggesting just some kind of mold or whatever.
We will put a little bird here or something to add the interesting.
With his tail facing this way.
And he was sitting there.
And I got for the bird.
Well, this hibiscus is finished.
Now I want to put the signature somewhere.
We have to follow the flow.
It's a directional flow for that.
So I would just put it right here.
And the seal.
There is the painting of the hibiscus and the bird.
I usually start from the neck first, then the head and the body and the leg.
And the chest.
The head for it.
So a little bit, the hair, the ears.
After we examine a little bit, we draw the body.
And then we draw the back of the head.
And I would change the little brush to finish the job.
So the action is going like this.
One, two, one.
And two.
You get a leg.
And then you have one and two.
And about the chest here, we need some more action.
And then go one, two, one, two again.
Another one.
Right.
And then we go one, two, one, two.
And after all this, I just connect all those elements in the horse.
The hood.
Maybe I put the eyes on when this thing is dry up a little bit.
Maybe we put another horse on the top here with less value or different color.
Let's wash the brush.
With a small brush again.
So, there we go.
And then one, two, one, two again.
And the mane.
And the tail.
So it's a very casual way to achieve that effect.
Nothing tied up, but in a casual way.
It's fun.
And here's the eyes for this horse.
Now, the question is, should we put people in or not?
Maybe we can put some cowboys in there.
So we'll draw a cowboy somewhere here.
We're doing a cowboy, we probably need a lot more colors.
Let's see how it looks like.
Maybe put it up and see.
So, the painting, the center of interest is done.
Now what we want to do is to put the signature.
So I'll put it here.
And the seal to balance it.
Okay.
This art takes time and needs practice.
So it looks maybe easy, but to have it in control,
you need to practice the brush work for a long time.
That's why I suggest you work on one brush, one type of brush first.
Like I use my favorite one.
Not too big, but you use it and get used to it.
Then you control the brush work well.
One step at a time, you improve and you have in control the water,
in control the action, and you'll be successful in this brush painting.
I hope you enjoy this demonstration and start working on it.
Bring good results, I'm sure you'll enjoy it.
Thank you.
You could use that brush from the first.
We're going to talk about brush painting.
Take another one.
Welcome everybody to this Chinese brush work.
I have plenty of paint for your painting.
This cat happens to be trying to participate in this workshop.
There we go.
My studio and my teacher.
Teachers on the top level of my studio.
A few steps up is the teacher.
A few steps down is my studio.
Back to the studio, go to the teacher.
That's all I need.
That's a triangle right there.
That's a triangle right here.
The composition is the same.
Good luck.