Three things you need. Black ink. White paper. One brush. It sounds simple. Don’t be fooled. Most people think they can learn ink painting in an afternoon. Then they try it and their paper looks like a mess. Ink painting doesn’t care about how confident you feel. Visit that site!

Signing up for a course isn’t about learning new techniques. It’s about changing the way you see things. A bamboo stalk isn’t something in the background. It becomes a record of how it grew how the wind affected it and how it bends. You can’t learn this by watching videos. It takes time, practice and a lot of paper that doesn’t turn out right.

When you start you grip the brush tightly. This is what usually happens. The you grip, the less movement you have and your lines look lifeless. A good teacher will notice this away. They won’t just tell you to relax. They’ll stand next to you. Wait until you loosen up.

A good course follows an order but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. It starts with strokes. Pulling, pressing and moving your brush in simple ways that sound boring until you realize you’ve been doing them wrong. Then you learn the bone line, which shows how tense your hand is. After that you learn to paint four subjects: plum blossoms orchids, bamboo and chrysanthemums. These aren’t things to paint. They have meaning behind them. Bamboo bends to survive. Plum blossoms bloom in the cold. If you don’t understand this your paintings will look empty.

Nobody talks about how important it’s to be calm and focused. If your mind is a mess your painting will be too. Experienced artists get quiet before they start painting. They do this because its necessary. If you don’t learn to be calm on you’ll spend months wondering why your paintings don’t feel right.

The ratio of water to ink is crucial. One brushload of ink can create tones depending on how much water you add. Dry bristles can create texture while much ink can make a mess. The real skill is finding the balance between what you intend to do and what happens by accident.

As you get more advanced you learn about composition. Grouping things in numbers using empty space and creating movement, with diagonal lines. Yes experienced painters think about the humidity when they paint. The type of paper they use can be affected by moisture. That’s something you have to consider.