Has it been a month already? I haven’t noticed that I have not been around for almost a month now! I’m so sorry 
But I’m back and I’m committing to a more regular blogging. 
This means new freebies, by the way. LOL.
Anyway, to start my big comeback (teehee), I want to show you one of the many things I’ve been doing lately and that is Chinese painting! 
One very kind (and very patient) professor in the University of the Philippines, Professor Esguera, has been giving us free basic Chinese painting lessons weekly. He has been truly patient and compassionate with our work. And you read it right, the classes were FREE. It is so kind of him to do this thing for us. And what was even more amazing was that Auntie Betty brought brushes and rice paper and shared them with the whole class. See how the world has so many kind and compassionate people?
His first lesson was the basics of drawing bamboo. When he demonstrated how to paint it, I thought to myself, “well, this is easy! I can totally do this!”. Well what do you know, it was hard.
Chinese painting requires concentration, precision and detail, not to mention your love for art and a creative eye. It was so different from Western art. Look how calm our teacher was while painting an image from a book:
I don’t know what this plant is supposed to be. LOL But it looks so pretty!
Being beginners, we can only use news prints and newspapers first before we can use the rice paper. This was his version of the bamboo on news print:
Our teacher asked me to finish painting the leaves of the bamboo but I refused because I told him I will frame this painting and so I wish to keep it “unspoiled” . teehee. And so it looks a bit bare. Okay, so maybe it will look weird when framed. But I have yet to gain the confidence to draw the leaves on those branches so until then, it will remain as is.
I made my own version because I didn’t want to touch his work at all. And here’s how it turned out:
Please don’t mind the newspaper print. teehee. A classmate of mine said it looked like a rain forest. boohoo. I guess I got carried away with the leaves. 
But I feel that I have improved because I practiced a lot during class. Professor Esguera’s second lesson was Lan Hua which is a type of yellow orchid. After the class, he asked us to paint a Lan Hua and show it to him next meeting. Check out my homework:
Pretty nice, right? This was my first time to paint on rice paper and I was so nervous that I would spoil the whole painting. Took me three times to come up with this. It’s not perfect but I think I got the basics.
And because I’m getting good at it (ahem! LOL), I made a special case for my artwork and some unused rice paper out of scrap illustration board and a beautiful image from a large calendar.
I love how the calendar image suits the purpose for the case perfectly. The image in the calendar is also a type of Chinese painting… I think.
Anyway, we still have 2 more lessons to go — the plum and chrysanthemum. I’ll try to paint a bamboo and show it to all of you. ;P
For now, I leave you with this quote from Pablo Picasso:
“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.”
Have a lovely week ahead!
Receive your freebies and other creative ideas via email! Subscribe now!
