Friday, November 9, 2007

Mudan and Mei: Elegance in Contrast

It's Friday again, last day of the working week, and the eve of weekends. Temperatures during the week have dipped considerably, heralding the impending winter months, times that we people from the tropics are much less enthused about.

My new brush pens arrived today, courtesy of a friend who brought them back with her from Taiwan. However, none turned out to be the exquisitely fine-tipped "red bean" brush that my teacher has raved about. Guess I'll have to look elsewhere.

The subject of today's arts lesson is the peony, aka Mudan in Chinese. It's one of the two floral symbols of China, the other being the plum blossoms (Mei), also featured here but are from my works of Oct 23, according to the dates at the back of the drawings.

The peony is a popular floral painting hung in chinese homes, as attested here (Lin's home, the backdrop to the second image from top).

Here they are, the Mudan and the Mei alternating.

The Mudan in pair.

The Mei in two clusters.


The trio of Mudan.
The Mei in discrete locations.

Another trio of Mudan.

5 comments:

Lee Wei Joo said...

Mom's paintings get more and more beautiful. I especially liked the first and fourth mudans, rich in color, tone and depth.

Release Live said...

Great job, it is looking nice.

I like all, but here is my favorite start from the favoritest

1) I just love the richness, it is bit different than usual flower, this time it is more "rich" or I should say blooming. I love the second flower, how she draw, the light whitish outside layer of the flowers are just beautiful, like in the dream,..


4) it's hard not to love the cheeryflower, is that how u call it. oh well, but I love this one because it stand out and give me a very elegant refreshing feeling. but i like it is by itself, because cheeriesflower is taiwan's national flower, it stand for couragous and if u ever heard our national athems, you will knew why I like number4 because it kind of remind me about our national athem.


5) pretty, and very vivid and feel so "joyful", I feel so happy, this flower is representating of "fu-quan" joy-and speical, in chinese. and she did a well job to draw it out,

3)2) both are great too...


hehehe., I am getting more and more professional on giving my feedgback. (just kidding)

I enjoy see the new art work from Beekhoon sister weekly,

thank you for sharing it with us.

smile,.

Bee said...

Another name for the Mudan (peony) is the flower of wealth and elegance, literally translated. But as the wise Buddha admonished, observe, enjoy, and let go.

Release Live said...

thanks for the tips

c.y. lee said...

Beautiful!! I really really love them all... In particular I like the 1st, 2nd, and 4th one most. Also--great job on the header, Dad! Looks like some of Mom's artistic talent is rubbing off on you. Heehee