Japanese Characters in Watercolours

 

In our latest watercolour session, we painted Japanese Characters in our own western way. Although some of us painted them the Japanese way, with a big pointy brush and very Zen, mindful and careful. All of them are beautiful in their own way, and as you can see above there was enthusiasm and diligence!

Corinne painted the big character that translates into LOVE. She added a background in soft tones with more characters and thus created a composition that would be fantastic for a Japanese film poster.

Martine also created a poster-like image, started with a background and then practised her spontaneous side, with a big brush and using lovely words, like respect and royalty, life and happiness
To translate use this chart:

And here's her practise page

Anna did a perfect 'Love' character and experimented with the background. She's not too happy about how that worked out, and I agree. The great thing about watercolours is, that is is quite spontaneous, you can learn from your 'mistakes' and just start again you on a new piece of paper! 

Thecla spontaneously painted 'Life' (above) and then 'Fire' - in that way painting her last name, which means Fire. She also started a quite technical abstract, inspired by her travels in Mauritius the last weeks, It is still pencil-only but hopefully we will see it in painting stages one of these weeks!

Charlie painted a lot of these little Japanese fish, in quick strokes. This one I think was the best, so transparent and quick, like the carps themselves. You feel their moves. Great idea!

Laura has a very steady painting hand! I love everything about this painting, the colours, the style and the sturdy elegance. Well done!

And lastly, a magnificent character by Roxane, Not sure what it is, but the handwriting is perfect - you can see she means it. Determined, bright and elegant. Love it!

In the meantime...

Next to a lot of other characters, Roxane painted this amazing landscape in the last 5 minutes. So simple and at the same time it tells a lot! So cool that snow on the mountain, just by leaving white!

Anna finished her leaves in the early sunlight

And Martine added some green to the black background of her plants. I would have thought improving would be impossible, but yes, it is even better now!