Final Session

This is to be the last entry in this blog. As such I prepared a piece which I created purely from myself. I used no reference aside from what techniques I remember from studying the book. I call it Black Tree Overlooking the Ocean. Rather grand, no? It could be argued that this painting does not show the technical skill of some other works I've done these past four weeks, but I think that it is simple. Simple is good. One thing I tried to avoid is cluttering the piece with too many details or different objects. One might wish to display everything learned at once, but I believe that is counter-productive. I already showed what I've done before, and now I wanted to do something different. I enjoyed working with sumi, and I think I'll continue working with it sometime in the future.

Taking a Step Back

I feel like I've been getting too riled up on this last couple sessions, and because of that I haven't been able to paint well both techinically and in the spirit of sumi. So I've decided to use this session to expain a little bit of history and to take another look at a famous sumi master.


Sumi history extends thousands of years in the past. Now I won't go too much into detail on how it evolved step by step, but one of the largest influences to sumi was Buddhism. In Japan, the art-form was practiced by monks and samurai as a way of calming the mind. They would spend time before painting to meditate, and the preparing of the inkstone and the brush was part of this meditation too. For me, I'm using this blog post and history lesson as meditation for my final piece. All this preparation and philosophy went into the process. For samurai, the brush was symbolic of the sword and practicing sumi taught them how to remain calm and collected. Nowadays, although the samurai are gone the art-form of sumi persists.




This brings me to my next subject which is Sesshu Toyo, a famous master sumi painter. He is most famous for his landscapes such as the one shown above which is entitled View of Ama-no-Hashidate. Considering the work that I've done, I can hardly imagine the time and concentration it must have taken to paint something so large and detailed. The reason I picked Sesshu Toyo as an artist for me to look at was that he has this piece, Haboku-Sansui, shown to the left. It is remarkably different from the painting shown above, but is just as beautiful and elegant. I am using Toyo to find inspiration in using sumi in a way I had not thought of. His "splash-ink" style to the left is one subject that interests me. I believe I will be ready to do something good for the next session.

Nearing the End

After a rough week, I was finally able to get back to doing some sumi. I'm a little bit rusty, but I remember all the processes required. To try to get me back into the swing of things I did a couple pieces which were less serious than some others I've done, and as a result are not as high of a quality. Regardless, I enjoyed painting them and it did me some good practice. Below you can see two paintings, one is of a mouse while the other is a painting of one of my favorite foods, shrimp.

One of the dilemas I've been having is that this week is the last week I'll be doing this sumi blog. I want to something special or something above par from what I've usually been doing. I was hoping that this session would help give me inspiration.

Now For Something Completely Different

Instead of following instructions specifically from the book I've been using, I decided to find a different reference. Tensho Shubun was a famous Japanese sumi painter. One of his most famous pieces of art and also a Japanese national treasure, Reading in a Bamboo Grove, is shown to the right. I decided to imitate this piece and combine what I had already learned with what I could discern from studying Shubun's painting. I found the most difficult part was creating the thin lines. I used effectively no water in the brush in order to create dark prominent lines, which made it so the brushstrokes did not flow as easily. My production is shown below, which as you can tell is a far cry from the original masterpiece.

Actual Accomplishment

Today I practiced painting a scene. A simple scene, but one that I painted from my head and not from a diagram. Looking back I feel that I've come a long way in the last couple of weeks. While I still have a long way to go before I'd call myself proficient in sumi, I am able to create a painting that can truly say I am proud of. In this case I have the painting of the bird to the left, and the painting of plum blossoms to the right. I am pleased with the variation in ink intensity as well as the composition. From this point forward I plan to try painting more complex subjects and scenes.

Sumi Animals

Okay, so two animals. But still, the title fits. Moving away from just painting plants, I looked up in the book how to paint some animals. In this particular case I practiced painting a bird and a crab. The products shown here may not seem like much, but they are miles ahead of my first attempt at the creatures. The newspaper practice pays off. The trick with painting animals seems to be to capture the energy and life of the creature. And for someone like me who is relatively inexperienced with Sumi, I have trouble balancing that energy with trying hard to get the form correct. However, I am mostly satisfied with what you can see in the picture. I think I'll soon be done with practicing single objects at a time, and will move on to constructing scenes.

Bamboo

Bamboo is a subject that I'm interested in painting. It is simple, yet elegant. More importantly, it involves using the three ink method and repeatedly charging the brush with different levels of ink. I am not as pleased with my current painting as I was with the flowers from the last session, but I am steadily getting better at sumi-e overall. I am starting to notice the source of some of my flaws. In this particular example, I used a little too much water and I could not produce the rich black tones I had wanted. The ink/water ratio still seems to be hit-or-miss with me. What seems to be just right can actually be too light and as a result bleed throughout the paper, making it harder to get a clearer tone afterwards. I plan to practice with painting bamboo some more in the future. Hopefully it will help me improve quickly enough that I may try my hand at producing a full scenery.

Progress with Charging the Brush

With practice I have been better able to create different tones with the ink. I find this session to be my most successful yet. I practiced using the methods the book described for painting certain flowers. I did not use as much water so there is less "bleeding" on the paper. My forms are still weak, but that will fix itself with more practice with the brush. The hardest part, preparing the brush with different tones, is already becoming simpler. I have gotten used to the process of dipping the brush into ink and water, and then testing it on a white plate and practicing strokes on newspaper. I am satisfied with my progress.

Applying the Three Ink Method

The three ink method of Sumi-e, as mentioned earlier, involves charging the brush with three different "layers" of varying ink/water ratios. I am finding this to be the most difficult part of the Sumi-e process. The water content has to be just right to get the desired tone. I have started using it to paint leaves and blades of grass, relatively simple objects. However, unless the brush is charged properly, then the effect is ruined and it does not come out looking like the subject. Here is a simple comparison between my work and the examples in the book I am learning from.