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Gong Bi has a lot of meanings. Within the phrase Gong Bi, Gong takes on the that means of “refined”, “detailed”, “delicate”. Bi usually designates the instruments for writing, but it surely additionally has the that means of “to write down”. By this we already guess the type of painting similar to this time period. The Gong Bi method subsequently seeks finesse, the precision of particulars. It requires good method and quite a lot of persistence.
Supplies and helps
Gong Bi is practiced on non-absorbent paper or on silk.
For the contours we use a Lang Hao brush. We should distinguish primarily 4 kinds of Lang Hao brushes:
- The Hong Mao (purple hairs) for thick traces. The Yi Wen (folds of garments) for lengthy traces (outlines of garments for instance). The Ye Jing (leaf veins) for the define of flowers and leaves. The Xie Zhua (crab claw) for the best traces (dragonfly wings for instance.)
However I strongly advise to make use of a small brush Xiao Bai Gui. Grasp Wang Shuhui, well-known for the smoothness of his traces, solely used a Xiao Bai Gui brush to attract all kinds of contours.
Two brushes Yang Hao are then vital: one to use the colours contained in the contours, the opposite, soaked in water, to shade and degrade the colours.
Relying on the floor to be coloured, three brush sizes are used, the names of that are as follows:
- Da Bai Yun (Nice white cloud) massive measurement. Zhong Bai Yun (lit.: Medium white cloud) medium measurement. Xiao Bai Yun (Small white cloud) small measurement.
These three brushes all belong to the Yang Hao genres, however they’re explicit to the appliance of colours in Gong Bi.
The completely different levels of Gongbi painting
I The road of the sketch
Two strategies are potential:
The primary consists in tracing the sketch instantly on the sheet you wish to paint with a 2B pencil. However because the rice papers are very skinny and subsequently fragile, you can’t actually erase and hint with out damaging the help. So it’s important to get it proper the primary time. Some small corrections by barely erasing are nonetheless potential.
The second technique consists of first tracing the sketch on a ordinary drawing sheet (Western or Chinese, it doesn't matter). We then place this sheet on the paper that we wish to paint, the sketch upwards. With the pencil, we then return over the contours as a way to go away an imprint on the sheet beneath. This then has barely printed contours. We are able to then begin painting it. If the printed outlines usually are not sufficiently seen, you’ll be able to hint them barely with a 2B pencil. This technique is longer, but it surely permits to not injury the rice paper and likewise to reuse the draft to redo the same painting.
II The drawing of contours
The outlines are drawn in black ink with the brushes talked about above. Watch out to not make traces of the identical thickness. The upstrokes and downstrokes are crucial and it occurs that you just discover painters who don’t pay a lot consideration to them.
Lastly, relying on the colour tone you propose to make use of for every half, it’s essential to take note of the ink density for the outlines.
III The applying of coloursIt’s executed in a number of levels. Earlier than enterprise every step, ensure that the colours utilized beforehand are fully dry. We first apply the colour with a brush then, with one other soaked in water, we shade and degrade the colours.
