The ink painting (or Jiu Jing Mo Shui Hua ) starts when a brush touches a paper and the moment is always similar to the breath taking. Even a single stroke in ink painting may speak lowly, or may scream. There’s no undo button. That’s part of the thrill. One slip and the paper is remembered forever. One swaggering line and a picture breathes. Browse lesson previews and view more examples.

The brush control contains the expression. Grip matters. Press the brush too hard and the line is as rigorous as a set of teeth. Open what you have clenched and the stroke begins to play. Suppose that the brush were a wind on a reed. It spins, it does not give way, it retro-flows. When it comes to pressure everything is different. It makes you pale when rubbed against. It goes deeper, and the ink goes deep, dark, and composes his mind.

Emotion is false of swiftness. Fast strokes are energetic and daring like drawing on the phone. A deliberate and slow pace is thoughtful, heavy, tender, sometimes, of course. Try both on the same page. Let them argue. That tension adds flavor. Flat strokes feel calm. Stroke twisting strokes are wanton. Neither is better. They just use another language.

The other mute narrator is the ink dilution. An authoritative ink is a clotted one. The misty water ink is like gossips in the room. Load the brush unevenly. Let one side carry more ink. Then, it is almost automatic that a single stroke decomposes into light and dark. Lopsided loading may generally be fruitful accidents. They’re gifts, not mistakes.

Paper is respectable, textile. Uncrezzled gowling like ice skates. Rough paper fights back. It takes up the bristles, makes jagged ends. Both have their charm. Substitution of paper can be similar to the substitution of instruments. Same song, different sound.