Week 1

Demonstration Art

From an ukiyo-e print by Katsushika Hokusai (1760 - 1849) in his Small Flowers series. See discussion.

Calligraphy, Sketches, & Demonstration Painting

Calligraphy

The native Japanese word for cosmos is akizakura (literally meaning autumn cherry blossom), and it is written using these kanji characters:

秋桜

The word much more commonly used for cosmos in Japan today, however, is kosumosu. Kosumosu is a loan word derived from the English word, "cosmos". As such, it is usually written using the phonetic katakana syllabary as shown below for those who want to practice their calligraphy.

Sketches

The cosmos sketches shown below are relatively simple line drawings that exclusively use senbyō (line) strokes. Choose which ever sketch you are most comfortable with for practice.

Demonstration Painting

Here is this week's demonstration painting. This painting uses the kōrokutensai-hō approach of combining outlines (senbyō-hō) with boneless strokes (mokkotsu-hō) to fill in the interiors. It doesn't matter which you do first, but I did senbyō-hō first for this painting. Those who don't have colors can use plane sumi for the flower interiors by loading the brush with two shades of sumi; tanboku (light sumi) first with chūboku (medium sumi) on the tip afterward.