Crazy Daisy Arts: Chinese Painting Workshop

This past weekend at the Scottish National Gallery, they had a Chinese Ink Painting workshop which I was really excited to attend. I did Chinese painting in college and I adored it, and was thrilled to try it again. The class was originally for October 12, but it was full, so they ran a second class on the 26th, which I was lucky to get into.

We had the same problem at my college, the class was only offered once a year and it always filled up right away. We had a professor from China who was a famous artist there. Our supplies all came from China, which I still have...beautiful brushes, bottled ink, stick ink, ink stone, Chinese watercolors and rice paper. Unfortunately, all my stuff is back at my parents house in the US, there was only so much I could bring with me overseas.

There is a Chinese grocery store that I go to a lot here, (I love making my own wontons and dumplings and miso soup) and they have a small selection of art supplies, so today I went in and bought some ink and a brush to work with until I can get my supplies from home.

I really love the smell of Chinese ink...and oil paint. Stinky art supplies are the best! They smell like art :)

So here are some of my practice drawings from the class. We were working on plum trees and blossoms, and we had to learn all the brush strokes for flowers, branches, and how to fill them in.