Calligraphic Line - The Oriental influence

In continuing with different styles of line, last week I practised line with tonal variations, and this weeks exercise is a study of calligraphic line - free flowing lines that make use of the graceful curves and loops our wrists, arms and upper body makes when controlling the drawing instrument.

Chinese and Japanese art traditionally uses a very strong link between calligraphy (beautiful writing) and drawing. The picture on the left is by a Chinese artist Kao in the 14th Century and clearly shows the bold, expressive line used on his torso where he would have used his whole arm and wrist in a calligraphic motion. This style is all about the interactions of the drawing tool with the physical movements our hand and body makes.

The drawings on the right are done in black watercolour with a very thick brush on heavy weight paper (was supposed to use India Ink, but didn't have any...) The painting was not to take more than about 5 minutes. I was supposed to respond with body movements to the visual movement of the drapes of the folds of the sheet. I tried to be very flowing and use my wrist and whole arm to capture the style. It would have been better to think about varying the thickness of the lines as my wrist curved. It was an interesting exercise using a style and technique I hadn't tried before... This style can be further studied and refined if you're interested in doing Ink Wash Painting.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ink_and_wash_painting