The Cultivation and Achievements of Using Chinese Ink and Brush to Paint "Western Painting"

 The Cultivation and Achievements of Using Chinese Ink and Brush to Paint "Western Painting"

By ChunYi Long 

Foreword: Mr. Long Chunyi uses Chinese raw Xuan paper, brush and ink, and the free-hand spirit of Chinese painting to create "Western paintings." He combines Western concepts of color and light with Chinese brush and ink techniques to create a new kind of "Western Impressionist" work. This is a tribute to and reverence for traditional Chinese culture and art! It is a manifestation of confidence in traditional Chinese culture and art! What he is trying to do is to let Chinese culture and art go abroad and be promoted and developed. Mr. Long Chunyi's innovative works are Chinese-style Impressionist "Western paintings," an intervention and invasion of Western culture by Chinese culture and art, a manifestation of Chinese culture going global and being promoted and developed, rather than being feared as "foreign garbage" at the slightest hint of "foreignness"! China's confidence stems from your reverence and worship of traditional Chinese culture. If you have a steadfast heart, you will dare to face the world, possess an inclusive mind that embraces all things, and dare to both "bring in" and "go out."

You reap what you sow. Mr. Long Chunyi, using traditional Chinese ink and brush techniques combined with Western color concepts, paints "Western paintings" on raw Xuan paper. His patient cultivation over a decade has finally yielded fruitful results. Such achievements are indeed hard-won, far more difficult than cultivating real fruits. Without a genuine passion and unwavering dedication, where would one find such determination and motivation?

Mr. Chun-Yi Long, a Chinese-American, has lived and worked in the United States for nearly 40 years. His original job was as a senior computer software engineer, earning a substantial annual income. Developing computer software was his job, and he excelled at it. However, painting was his greatest passion, especially when he felt compelled to create a new painting style—using traditional Chinese ink and brush to depict "Western painting." He finally couldn't resist the urge, and more than ten years ago, he gave up his high-paying job to pick up his brush again and begin studying and researching painting.

Mr. Long Chunyi's decades of living experience in the United States, coupled with his dual cultural background and profound influence from both Eastern and Western cultures, led him to the idea of ​​using the expressive spirit of Chinese ink painting and the color concepts of Western painting to create "Western-style" works. He initially considered starting with oil painting, focusing on Chinese themes. He studied the works of many Western Impressionist masters, such as Monet, Van Gogh, and Gauguin, to understand their use of color, tone, light and shadow, and space. Then, he began experimenting with Chinese ink painting on rice paper. He studied the works of renowned Chinese masters, learning from Zhang Daqian's splashed ink and color techniques, Lin Fengmian's Western-style color usage, Huang Yongyu's lotus paintings, Zao Wou-Ki's Chinese abstract paintings, and Wu Guanzhong's expanded subject matter beyond just "high mountains and flowing water." He also studied many "commercial paintings" that dared to challenge tradition and innovate, absorbing much inspiration from them. Through repeated contemplation and practice, he finally found his own path in painting.

As the saying goes, "No pain, no gain," and hard work always pays off. Through countless failures and successes, Mr. Long Chunyi recognized and summarized the following: First, he explored how to express Western-style colors on Chinese raw Xuan paper using Western painting color concepts. Through repeated practice, by controlling and fully utilizing the paper's absorbency and diffusion, he allowed the ink and color to blend naturally, creating a color and layering effect that resembled yet differed from Western painting—a style unlike any other. Second, he introduced the concept of "writing and painting" from Chinese painting into his brushwork. Chinese brush techniques, such as the central and side strokes, dry and wet brush techniques, etc., could be fully utilized in the practice of painting Western works, thus forming a style that blends Western and Chinese elements. Third, in terms of painting concepts, it introduces the freehand techniques of Chinese painting, emphasizing artistic conception. The new Western painting is no longer a physical, formal beauty, but rather an expression of a chemically synthesized spiritual beauty. Fourth, in terms of form, it introduces the idealistic, conceptual form of Chinese painting, no longer pursuing the realism and accuracy of objects, but rather the objects as perceived by the artist. Finally, in terms of composition, in terms of space and light and shadow relationships, it introduces the more advanced multi-point perspective of Chinese painting (which can be achieved with modern mobile phone photography) instead of the fixed-point perspective of traditional Western painting. Practice has proven that "the integration of Chinese and Western art" is not just about "using foreign things for Chinese purposes," but also about "using Chinese things for foreign purposes." Mr. Long Chunyi's freehand "Western painting" on Chinese raw Xuan paper using Chinese brush and ink is a good example of "using Chinese things for foreign purposes."

Browsing through Mr. Long Chunyi's paintings, many people's first impression is that his works resemble Western paintings. This is understandable, as his starting point is to use Chinese ink and brush to create a "Western" style, thus creating a new approach to Western painting. To be more specific, his works resemble the Impressionist style of Western painting, but not entirely, because traces of Chinese ink and brushwork are visible within them. Why does it resemble "Impressionism"? The root cause is that both Chinese "freehand brushwork" and Western "Impressionism" no longer pursue the realism and accuracy of objects. Although they reach the same goal, their starting points are fundamentally different. Chinese "freehand brushwork" expresses objects and multi-point perspective through light and shadow in an intentional, spiritual, and Zen-like way; while Western "Impressionism" pursues a visual aesthetic through abstraction, color, and light and shadow.

It's been 150 years since Western artists, influenced by Chinese painting and Japanese Ukiyo-e, created Impressionism. Now, Mr. Long Chunyi uses Chinese Xuan paper as the base and medium for modern painting, experimenting and expressing himself through brush and ink techniques. The brushwork is no longer merely the smearing function of Western brushes, but rather takes on a certain "writing" characteristic. This fully embodies the "mediumness" of art, meaning that modern painting no longer imitates or "presents" the objective world, but rather "represents" a new art world. Even with media materials derived from traditional Chinese traditions, Mr. Long Chunyi's works reveal the modern spirit of contemporary Chinese artists and their composed and serene engagement with the world. In the context of contemporary culture's mediativity, technological sophistication, and cross-disciplinary nature, the distinction between old and new, East and West, has become a subtly influential foundation for humanity's shared value recognition of the contemporary art scene.

A close examination of Mr. Long Chunyi's paintings reveals a rich artistic foundation, blending the cheerful, bright, and colorful Impressionist style of Western painting with the profound and evocative charm of traditional Chinese painting. To truly achieve the state of "the painting arises from the heart," a spontaneous expression of feeling, requires long-term practice. One day, one will see a qualitative leap from quantitative change; haste makes waste. His more than ten years of dedicated work, consistently painting daily, studying the works of others, and reflecting on his own earlier pieces, have allowed him to witness gradual, incremental progress. He has reaped what he sowed, and this has led to his initial success.

Enjoy more works: