To complement the freehand figures in our July 2023 Newsletter, Peng has shared a few videos featuring contemporary figure painter Fan Zeng 范曾.

• Some of his paintings.
• Videos 1, 2, 3 .
• Fan Zeng’s painting of Laozi – and a connection to Stephen Hawking!
• Interview and a portrait of Einstein!  Plus an insight into how Rong Bao Zhai recreates paintings by woodblock printing.  They seem to have published at least one book of his work.

Figures are often depicted in gardens – lovely ladies by characterful rocks or scholars at an elegant gathering.    On gardens:

• The Huntington has a Chinese Garden, and has made podcasts of a conference on Chinese garden scholarship: interesting, though it is frustrating that we can’t see the images mentioned.
• Angela loves Chinese gardens – including a few outside China.

Liang Kai (Song dynasty)  painted the Sixth Chan Patriarch Chopping Bamboo – wonderfully expressive brushwork!  Strangely, the sound of chopping bamboo is a thing on the internet, including two whole hours of it!  Different sounds of bamboo – bamboo musical instruments worldwide.

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