Entering the Dark Mountain
While my previous work sought clarity through reduction, this phase of Huang Binhong style landscape painting (influenced by my dissertation on Chinese painting) seeks depth through accumulation. In this accumulated ink painting I immersed myself in the style of the modern master Huang Binhong (黄宾虹). His philosophy turned my understanding of ink upside down. Instead of the single, perfect stroke, he advocated for “Blackness, Density, Thickness, and Heaviness.” These works are not about the shape of the mountain, but about its sheer mass and internal chaos.
1. Accumulated Ink (Ji Mo)
Layer upon Layer (Ji Mo 积墨)
The central technique here is Ji Mo (积墨 – Accumulated Ink). Instead of finishing a painting in one go, I apply layer after layer of ink. Wet ink over dry ink, dry brush over wet wash. The paper becomes heavy, almost sculptural. This creates a texture of immense complexity—a visual “noise” that mimics the tangled undergrowth of a real forest.
2. The Five Blacks
He, Mi, Hou, Zhong (黑密厚重)
Huang Binhong defined the qualities of great painting as: Black (Hei 黑), Dense (Mi 密), Thick (Hou 厚), and Heavy (Zhong 重). In these Huang Binhong style landscapes, I explore the beauty of darkness. The “White” (Void) is almost squeezed out of the picture, remaining only as tiny “eyes” or “breaths” that let the light shine through the crushing weight of the ink mountains.
3. Chaos and Order
Disordered Order
At first glance, these paintings look like chaos. But as Huang Binhong said: “In the chaos, there is order.” By building up the ink dots and strokes chaotically, a higher order emerges—the organic order of nature itself. It is a move away from the “clean” design of Constructivism towards the “messy” reality of life.
Night Walk
Seeing in the dark. If my Minimalist landscapes are like seeing a mountain in the bright sunlight, these accumulated ink paintings after Huang Binhong landscapes are like walking through a forest at night. Forms are indistinct, merged into shadows. The focus shifts from seeing (visual) to feeling (tactile). It is the most abstract and arguably the most “modern” phase of traditional Chinese ink painting.
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