Journey of Ten Thousand Miles

chinese ink painting on Minou washi 美濃和紙 with kisshou watercolor cakes 吉祥顔彩　and ikkyuen's calligraphy brush shakei 一休園の写経.

chinese caption reads:
The Hawk's journey of Ten Thousand Miles
the year of renchen eighth month sixteenth day
moyan
鹏程万里
壬辰年八月十六日
默言
it is a common chinese phrase of well-wishing for someone starting off a career or any new endeavor. i guess this is just the right spirit in response to the back-to-school contest. you start somewhere, you will get somewhere if you don't stop and give up.

it is just a few hours before closing and i'm glad i managed to finish it in time. phew~!

the post to the contest is here:


and the previous ink painting i did was in 2006 when i was really a newbie in ink painting. my equipment was the cheapest i could find. because i did not want to ruin expensive stuff with my clumsy hands.



now that i have better skill, i am willing to invest in better materials, for i know i won't waste them. it is a sin to waste art material, especially paper. (i don't want to be an enemy to the forest and the environment.)

minouwashi is a really fabulous paper, its texture is like cotton cloth and though it feels so flimsy, it stays strong and resilient under several heavy water wash. no wonder the japanese tennou (emperor) writes his imperial edict on one of these papers. the price is um, wow, but worth every inch of it.
anyway so are the brush and colors truly good stuff. i am very, very in love with them.

by #dALinkSystem, look at some more wonderful work by chinese painting masters in dA: