art
-
Minimal Painting
Creating an interesting painting with lots of space and few brushstrokes is an ideal that I am often striving for. This painting uses an ink wash formation and a figure to describe place, scale, and mood.
-
Four Seasons Residency Cats
Four Seasons Art Center, where I just finished my one month residency had a lot of street cats. They were a tight group of cats that hung around all day together. Many had distinct personalities. Some were skittish and some were very friendly.
-
A Large Diptych
My residency at Foshan allowed me to work larger than I usually do. One of the results is this diptych. I don’t think I’ve created a diptych before. The Art museum at Four Seasons has lots of wall space and I can see lots of the artists here are working hard to make large striking
-
Washing Clothes
I’m finishing up a month-long painting residency at an art center and modern art museum in Foshan, a non-descript third tier city on the fringe of Guangzhou. My first time washing clothes in a washroom tucked away a few floors below my studio was a bit foreboding. I couldn’t find the light switch and all
-
Self Portrait With Sketchbook
Recently I have been doing a lot of self-portraits. In general, it is easier to draw old people with their wrinkles and slack skin. My style often leans towards caricature, so I’m more concerned about catching a feeling or context then an exact likeness. I’m a bit wary of painting a person like the human
-
Subtleties of Chinese Technique
One of the things that I love about using chinese materials for painting, is how subtle color shifts, brushstrokes, and tones can carry so much meaning. Unfortunately, subtle is not in high regard in today’s art world, where size and bold color are in vogue. Loud art “experiences” are in vogue. Important artists must work
-
Landscape with Flowers
This painting is a good example of how I like a balance between entropy (let the ink and color takes is course) and control. Adding the little figure at the top left of the painting forces the viewer to see it as a landscape and creates a scale for the piece of land that the
-
So Many Nudes
I sketch models four hours a week. I have never considered that a key part of my artistic output but I enjoy the challenge of sketching with Chinese paper, ink and brushes. It is quite a difficult medium to control in that situation. I experiment with colors, work on powerful lines and brushwork and sometime
-
Contempary Chinese Art
When I describe my art in chinese for a chinese audience, I usually call it contemporary chinese art. I use chinese brushes, paper, and most importantly, chinese techniques. A painting like this, with calligraphy of the Northern Song Su Shi poem and two branches of peach blossoms illustrating some content in the poem, is not
-
Abstraction
I don’t have many paintings that are purely abstract, which in my mind means no attempt have any narrative image. I consider this painting a cityscape because of some of the straight lines embedded in it that suggest manmade structures. Abstract expressionism seems to be an undying genre for people creating art. Dramatic interplay of
-
Am I too cynical to create beauty?
I have been translating and illustrating classical Chinese poetry for kicks. I strive for English translations that are good modern poems, in the hope that poems written many millenia ago in a foreign language can have some relevance to a modern reader in English. This illustration started with a quick drawing I did of a
-
Laws of Color, Physics and Painting
My effort combine to words with images in my paintings have led me to think about the properties and rules of color. I learned that one of Newton less celebrated scientific breakthroughs was that he helped define color theory. This painting includes this poem: somewhere under a rainbow the artist works reflecting on refracted light