Week 15
Demonstration Art
Demonstration Painting -- Furōchōshun (不老長春) (Pine Tree & Roses)
Kakizome
In Japan, January 2nd is thought of as the "start of things" for the new year. In particular, it applies to writing or painting. Kakizome (書初め) is the word that describes the idea. It is that to start the new year right, you want to do the very best you can. Japanese make a point of writing something or painting something on January 2nd and putting extra effort into making what they do their very best.
Meaning in writing is important, but for our purpose here, think calligraphy. One of this week's objectives is to review the basics of Japanese calligraphy. The following two images provide a start. I covered this in our Zoom class.
The kanji character is ei and it means eternity. It is the character that is traditionally used when students are first exposed to the basic principals of calligraphy.
The following image shows the 8 basic calligraphy strokes and gives their names.
The following character is shōgatsu, New Year.
This final character is gantan (January 1).
Here is my demonstration painting.
