Recording Life with a painting Brush

Next to the bridge to Bribie Island, there is a Sandstone Point Hotel, which is located on the shore with a beautiful ocean view. Our family went there on a sunny Saturday. Merrily and enthusiastically, our boys refused to return home when they were playing in a playground on the top of a hill near the shore. "Why not have a walk in the lawn outside?" I said, "A few funny birds have been raised there, for which I don't know the names." Then the elder brother was holding the little hand of the younger one, laughing, giggling, and running here and there. I hurried to turn on my mobile phone to take a few photos. The photos captured the real scenes well, but they were lack of expressions of my own feelings and sentiments, which has driven me to paint the watercolour picture "Brothers" recently. I first used a dip pen to apply very light black colour to draw the boundaries of the boys. Then I slowly applied colours on them, first for the skin, then the clothes and finally the hairs. I wish they will be grateful to have a brother to play together at childhood and will love each other after they have grown up. I focus much for the boys on the picture, and after that, I loosely painted the backgrounds such as the lawn, the paths, trees and the sky. I tried to paint it in a more casual style,  so that my sentiments can over the picture with the colours more freely.

I recollect that painting was used to be my most favourite activity during childhood. I almost painted everything around me every day, though few people from school knew this until one day I presented a gouache painting of a village as a homework of school holiday. The village is my mother's hometown, and my grandma was still living there at that time. Every school holiday, I would spend a couple of weeks there, accompanying my grandma who typically lived there alone, but for that time my grandpa had back home from Hong Kong. "You paintings are great, and I'm proud of you!" Grandpa said, "But why not use a larger paper?" "I don't have paper in larger size." I said. Then he walked straight to a giant calendar on the wall, starring there for a while, and said, "I've no longer like it but you can paint on the back of the paper." He pulled a piece of paper from the calendar, and asked me to follow him to the entrance of the village where there were many pine trees standing by a pond. When the new semester started, almost all of my classmates shocked when they saw me submit the painting, and many of them ran to me to confirm if it was really done by myself. "He owns a seed of art, and is keen to find out different ways to solve problems in mathematics." My teacher gave such a comment in my student report. When the high school teacher got the report, she paid little attention to my potential in art, but said she's glad to know I was good at maths. At that time math was usually considered as an important foundation to a large number of professional careers, while art was only usually suggested for hobbies. As it had become clear that I could earn a life through STEM in future, my artist dream had been fully abandoned.

Very recently, as my sons like painting, I have resumed my painting as a hobby so that I can play with them. It is one of the most correct changes that I've ever made. On the day when I abandoned my painting brush, I'd also abandoned the way to appreciate surrounding things in life, and I've blocked the most effective way for me to express myself. Through picking up the painting brush again, I again picked up my approach to communicate with the world for many things, my philosophy, my feelings, my mind, and my sentiments. The beautiful views that I've often ignored, have again been impressed; while even the suffers in the past have become precious life experience that can nourished my art!

Brothers

 

Don’t let a mistake to stop finishing an artwork

Recently I've finished a watercolour painting about a boy in a presentation surrounding by his classmates. I started to paint in a late afternoon when my toddler was sleeping. But I couldn't finish it at that time as my toddler woke up and cried when I had just done a little bit. 

As I hurried to finish a few strokes before being able to tidy up the space, I'd left some mistakes on the paper. I felt very disappointed, and wanted to destroy the unfinished artwork. Fortunately I didn't make a determination to do that.

In the early morning of the next day, I woke up just before the sun rose. As usual , I wanted to find something to paint. I hesitated for a while for whether I should continue yesterday's work, or just throw the paper to a rubbish bin and start a new one. After a thought, I felt it too pity to throw it, or I might just be lazy to start a new one.

Surprisingly, after 1 finished the whole picture, it wasn’t looked that bad as what I thought it would be. It is true that these a mistakes were are still clearly there, but they are not as obvious as before, when the other parts of the picture had have been finished. I showed the picture to the boy whom I was painting.

 "This is me .” He said merrily, “I am doing a presentation at school. But daddy, you’ve made a silly mistake as the white board marker holder in my classroom was is not at that location.” He hasn’t realised the mistakes I meant.

When we judge an artwork, we focus on the whole effect. When we judge a person, we focus on the main characteristic. Don't let a single mistake to stop finishing the whole artwork, just as never allow a mistake to stop what we should live!

A Boy In A Presentation

 

Lullaby Time

 Two day age when I finished work in the late afternoon, my toddler boy was still sleeping. I went to look after him, and by the way I drew him sleeping. As the picture looked to be a bit boring, I applied imagination to draw myself sitting next to him, waving hands to sing lullaby, as what I usually did at night. I showed my picture to other family, but they were all confused about what I was doing.

Lullaby time, what a sweet moment for a little one and his dad! But it is a pity that people can't understand it from my drawing, and that is why I tried a second time. In the early morning of the next day, I couldn't sleep and woke up very early to paint another picture of lullaby time. I got rid of all toys on the bed this time, leaving just me and the little boy, Then I filled the upper space of the paper with a starring night! Then this time they all knew what I was painting and the lullaby was the nursery rhyme Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.

I began to know the power of imagination in painting, as though it is not real it make the real more understandable.

Lullaby Time

 

Sunset in the Park

 

My toddler has become rather tired and sleepy after spending a day in the childcare. In the late afternoon after I finished work, I put him to the pram and push him to have a walk in the park nearby. The sunshine from the waning sun had dropped through the gaps among leaves of trees to the ground. What a beautiful sunset view, with a moving melody of light and shadows. Soon the little child had fallen to sleep.

I pushed the pram back home, put the child to the bed, and later started to paint the sunset view in the park. I've admired art works of Claude Monet at and J. M. W Tuner for a long time. Both of them are among my favourite artists, and had strong capabilities to paint light and shadows. I first drew an orange sun in the middle of the paper. I applied water on the paper, and then slowly applied colours for the sunshine and clouds, allowing the colours flow on the wet paper freely. I dipped a bit of blue pigment for the top of the paper to draw the sky. 

After that, I painted the trees and the ground. I am grateful to live in a location closed to this beautiful park. I have once written a song called The park near home", which is for the park I painted today, and its name is "Burnie Brae Park".