Casey Shannon Studio Image

The Sound of One Hand: Reaching Beyond the limits of Traditional Ink Painting

Thursday, April 29, 2010

Red Moon over Bamboo


Red Moon over Bamboo


Into the field of
yellow flowers,
The red setting sun!
~ Natsume Soseki

This is a contemporary Sumi-e I created one evening while I was sitting in my studio 'day dreaming'. The image appeared to me very clearly as if by a mysterious magic. I love bamboo and the significance of this majestic plant of the grass family. I often use bamboo as the subject for my paintings.

Ever since the beginning of Chinese and Japanese writing and painting, bamboo has been written about and also been painted in the same manner, in other words, a work depicting bamboo is both a painting and a piece of calligraphy. There are so-called “bamboo painters” who all their lives paint only bamboo. "The bamboo is strong, upright, and dependable. He may bend with the wind, the storm and the rain, but he never breaks. He is a true gentleman of courage and endurance". (Ju 1989).

Bamboo also exhibits a certain visual appeal. Its straight stalk was the symbol of the sage, in that adversity could always bend it but it could never break it. I want to be like the mighty bamboo!

Red Moon over Bamboo may be purchased as a Fine Art Reproduction and the original can be seen in Gallery Spirit.

Casey Shannon Studio

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