04: Preliminary Chinese Abstract Works

Hello! This week I made three Chinese abstract paintings with colored ink. While I originally planned to continue studying more traditional Chinese styles in color, I decided that I can still practice adding color by jumping straight into an abstract Chinese style. I stick with the traditional shan shui 山水 but simplify everything to more abstract forms. Let’s get started.

First Painting

The first painting you see was the first one I made. I referenced an early Fong Chung-Ray painting for the broad black strokes–trying to figure out how to make them. The painting I references is #1964-51 and is the first one on this link. 

Everything I did in that painting was experimental. I had never done anything like it. Making the large black strokes was a lot of fun and I moved and lifted the brush in certain ways to get the desired effects. For the black parts that spread with water, it was quite a risk as I never added that much water and ink together, and you can see how faded the right blob is which is a mistake. 

I wanted my background to have color so I spread gray all over the place, soaking the paper. Now, time for the real color. I had a set of colored ink/paint meant to be used for traditional Chinese painting and mixed brown with red to get that tone. Taking a smaller brush, I dipped it into the ink (mixed with a little water) and a touch of black ink at the tip. Putting my brush on the paper sideways, I was able to place two colors and mix with ease.

Second Painting

My second painting is less impressive in that it’s not great. I squirted too much of the rasberry-ish color to mix with the brown in the first painting, so I decided to center my second one around red. I was curious about my own abilities to create an abstract landscape, so this time I did not reference a Fong Chung-Ray work. Instead I looked at a concept art for the Star Wars planet Dathomir. 

Thinking that this was supposed to be Dathomir is hilarious because it looks nothing like it. There are many mistakes in terms of composition and general brush strokes. Very little in this painting actually complement each other. There’s no direction, the black lines don’t guide your eyes anywhere, and everything is messy. A few things I took away (besides a reality check) was how the colored ink overlapped other layers and added white over my painting, which I would use in the third preliminary piece.

Third Painting

The third painting is my favorite of the three. The composition is the most sound and colorful. I referenced Fong Chung-Ray’s #82-73 which you can see at this link. This painting is more complex than the other two, so let us take a look at the steps I devised to reach the final stage.

While I did reference Fong Chung-Ray’s painting, the large black strokes–the backbone of the painting–ended up slightly different. This means I had to improvise the surrounding strokes to complement my main structure. I still had difficulties creating a firm dark gray that doesn’t spread, but the biggest feat was the last step: Adding white. 

I wanted to sprinkle white over the painting to create a snowy effect, but Fong Chung-Ray probably used acrylic and a collage method which I don’t know how to do. So, I needed to do it my own way. I got the colored ink/paint thing and a small/medium brush, and I made different textures of white all over the painting. The scariest part was adding white over the black, because it would be significantly harder to cover-up, but I have to say, it went better than expected.

Next Week

Next week, I will study and examine some Western Abstract Expressionists and their methods of painting. For that, I will be switching back to acrylic paints and mixed media paper (no canvas yet). Thanks for reading my blog and I hope you enjoyed these paintings!