Chinese Painting 國畫

Chinese Painting 國畫

Painting, Folk art, Decoration

Chinese painting is done on paper or silk, using a variety of brushes, ink and dye. Subjects vary, including: portrait, landscape, flowers, birds, animals, and insects.

Warring States period (475–221 BC)

Flat

Craft

Like calligraphy, traditional Chinese painting is done using a brush dipped in black ink or coloured pigments, usually on paper or silk. The finished work can be mounted on scrolls and hung.

- Gongbi (工筆) literally 'working pen', is a meticulous style, rich in colour and detailed brush strokes. It is often used for portraits or narrative subjects.

- Xieyi (寫意) meaning “freehand", is a looser style of painting, and usually used in landscapes. Xieyi often features exaggerated forms, and expresses the artist’s feelings. It is also called shuimo (水墨) meaning 'watercolour and ink'.

Ink, Pigment, Paper

Traditional painting has also been done on walls, porcelain and lacquer ware. Traditionally, paintings were used to visually record incidents or any object.

It would take years for a calligrapher to master this art.

It involved writing the letters perfectly, and since there are over 40,000 different characters in the Chinese alphabet, you can imagine how hard this was to master!