Week 4. Trying With Ink
哈喽啊 (hā lóu a)! We are back with Mr. Wang’s Tuesday Calligraphy class!
Since Virginia schools had ended Spring Break, there weren’t many participants with us this time. As a result, Mr. Wang was able to provide more individual assistance to each of us. Considering that all participants are beginners, we all practiced on newspaper with ink, so we are not wasting Xuan paper. Starting with the basic 横 (Héng) – Horizontal stroke and 竖 (Shù) – Vertical stroke, we practiced writing a lot of tens, 十, as they fulfill both types of strokes. After writing many 十s, we started imitating characters from different calligrapher styles, such as those by the calligraphy sage Wang Xizhi (王羲之), the famous Tang Dynasty Calligrapher Yan Zhenqing (顏真卿), notable calligrapher practitioner Liu Gongquan (柳公權), and many more.
I tried practicing with a few of Mr. Wang’s imitations of Yan Zhenqing’s style, but of course, my writing cannot compare to that of a skilled calligrapher practitioner or the famous Tang Dynasty Calligrapher. Mr. Wang mentioned multiple times that to become a good calligrapher, one needs to practice for at least 10,000 hours, or at least a minimum of a few hundred hours of practice to gain proficient writing. Wanting to create one’s individual style in calligraphy would take even longer practice.
Here are some of the characters I tried to imitate on the newspapers. The writing script is in Kai 楷书 (standard/formal script). I also tried writing in Li 隶书 (official script), but I think I enjoy writing in Kai 楷书 (standard/formal script) a bit more. Li 隶书 (official script) might be a bit easier to control with the brush, as they do not require specific direction on the tips of the characters. However, when writing in Li 隶书 (official script), the square-shaped characters are rounded at the edges, which makes it more difficult to write.
Here is a short presentation of Mr. Wang writing a set of words for the CCI, which I am pretty sure is going to be framed on the empty walls
I also started gathering materials for my final project, which I am extremely excited about starting.
See you next week!