HOW TO PAINT LAN ORCHID ?
《How to paint ‘Lan Orchid’ ?》
Q-About Lan Orchid
-Lan Orchid（兰花） in the Chinese painting is a small wild grass but not the same as we see in Singapore.-The lan orchid is much admired in Chinese painting because of its grace and exquisite beauty.
-Orchid is no piece of cake. In color and its morphology, the orchid is much simpler than other flower ;it seems at first blush to be just a combination of dots and lines. But the difficulty in orchid painting lies precisely in this simplicity. Because of the higher artists requirements of orchid painting, it has become an important means in training in the use of ink and brush in Chinese painting.
Q-How to paint Orchid blades?
-To make every stroke count, the botched strokes has no place hide.
-Use vertical stroke to paint the orchid leaves and leaves are thinner and the both end, for longer leaves using the strokes y slight lifting the brush ,press down as you continue and lift and press down again before lifting to exit. The press down create fatter in the leaves as know as the ‘ grasshopper stomach’(螳螂肚).
-The second leaf crosses the first leaf to form ‘feng yan’ (凤眼)or the eye of the phoenix .Do not make the eye too small, otherwise you will have a hard time adding more leaves across it. The leaves should not quite touch at the base. The third leaf is called the ‘po feng yan’ (破凤眼)or the one that breaks the phoenix eye.
Q-How to paint flowers?
-The flower needs to show the color tone.
-Fully bloomed orchids have five petals. If you look at your hand with your thumb and middle –finger tip touching, the shape make closely resembles an orchid.
-With the stroke for each petal, the first two strokes for the central two petals are usually very close together form also the phoenix eye. The third stroke should be smaller and broke the phoenix eye. The fourth and the fifth strokes are more open, one each side.
-Dark ink dots show the stamens, three for each flower. At the center of inflorescence is a funnel shape, which is where the stamen supposes to be.
-The flowers should bloom in all different directions and show both buds and fully blooming flowers.
-When painting multi-flowers, you can paint the flower first before connecting them to stalk and the stalk should follow the leaves. The flower is joining by a small stem to the stalk.
CONTACT: Dr Tan Ching Yam/ tanart60@yahoo.com.sg
