Sunday, January 31, 2021

Pictographic Chinese Calligraphy (56) Water Cube - 水立方


The character (s) in this artwork is 水 - water (small seal script).

Water Cube is the facility constructed to host the aquatics competitions at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics. 

Another famous facility for 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics is Nest-type Beijing Olympic Stadium. I created "Bird's Nest - 鸟巢” work in the previous post, which is the Chinese name of Nest-type Beijing Olympic Stadium. 

Water Cuber in Chinese is 水立方:水 - water,立方 - cube。

I use only one character Water (small seal script)


to form the artwork.

The big Water - 水 on the top, and many small Water characters form the edges of the cube: Water Cube.

The small seal script of water is like a swimmer who is swimming, especially when it is in horizontal position, which is exactly the facility used for. 

 


Sunday, January 24, 2021

Pictographic Chinese Calligraphy (55) Bird's Nest - 鸟巢

 The big seal script of character Bird is


The big seal script of character Nest is

The facility for 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics is called Nest-type Beijing Olympic Stadium. "Bird's Nest - 鸟巢” is the Chinese name of Nest-type Beijing Olympic Stadium, which is one of the two major facilities for 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics. The another one is called Water Cube (水立方), I ceated an artwork "Water Cube", you can see it in the next post.



Monday, January 11, 2021

Pictographic Chinese Calligraphy (54) We are easy to see each other but difficult to talk - 咱们见过面吗容易,拉话话难

 


There are 2 characters in the artwork:

1, the shell bone script of character Mountain


 2, the big seal script of character Meet

There is famous Chinese folk love song, singing a couple of loving young boy and girl in a mountain area, one song lyric sings: " is "We are easy to see each other, but difficult to talk" because they are separated by  the mountain.

Thursday, December 31, 2020

Pictographic Chinese Calligraphy (53) Stride into 2021 - 走进2021

 


In the top line, from left to right

Big (big seal script): a person open his arms and legs to make bigger.



Step (bronze script): two footprints - walking forward


Walk (big seal script): the top is a person who swings arms and walks forward, the bottom is a foot.



Forward (big seal script): the top left is Road or Street, the right one

is a bird. The bottom one is Foot. Ancient Chinese found that bird only walks forward, never walks backward. 

So we have "Big Step Walk Forward into 2021".


Tuesday, December 8, 2020

Pictographic Chinese Calligraphy (52) Once upon a time, there was a temple on a mountain ...... - 从前有座山,山上有座庙,。。。。。。

 "Once upon a time, there was a temple on a mountain where a old monk and young monk lived in. The young monk asked the old monk to tell stories, the old monk said 

'Once upon a time, there was a temple on a mountain where a old monk and young monk lived in. The young monk asked the old monk to tell stories, the old monk said

'Once upon a time, there was a temple on a mountain where a old monk and young monk lived in. The young monk asked the old monk to tell stories, the old monk said

'Once upon a time, there was ......'"

The young monk felled asleep.

This is a famous story every Chinese heard many times in his/her childhood by his/her Dad/Mom, or GrandPa/GrandMa

Let's see how to use calligraphy to show the story.

I just want to go the first part "Once upon a time, there was a temple on a mountain ......". You could imagine what happens in the temple.

Here is my artwork.


There are 3 characters: Mountain, Temple, and Cloud.

Character Mountain of shell bone script:

I eliminated the horizontal line on the bottom to make it more like a mountain.

Character Cloud of shell bone script:

The top 二 is the calm clouds, the hook alike on the bottom is swirling clouds. 

Character Temple of bronze script is



The cover 广 is big open space in front of a cliff. The right part is a river, we can see the water flow and water drops. The left part: middle (a circle with a dot inside) is sun, over and under it are grass. More than 3000 years ago, Kings occasionally chose a good day, went a big open space near a river when the sun just rises up a little bit higher than grass, held a ceremony to worship ancestors. The big open place where the ceremony was held is called Temple.

As time passed, the religious appeared, people built buildings in mountain area for regular religious activities, people called the buildings Temple. 



Tuesday, November 17, 2020

Pictographic Chinese Calligraphy (51) Race-walking - 竞走

 The shell bone script of Character Compete is



Two people standing side by side, just like the sprinters standing at the starting line. 

The bronze script of character Walk is


The top is a man moving his arms and walking in big steps, the bottom is foot. 

Here is my artwork "Race-walking"



 

Sunday, November 15, 2020

Pictographic Chinese Calligraphy (50) Float - 浮

The post has been collected in the book "Pictographic Chinese Calligraphy" published on Amazon as Paper book (Hardcover, and Paperback), and eBook. You could click the following link to get the information on Amazon,


Or you could search "Pictographic Chinese Calligraphy" on Amazon to find the book.

Home - 家

家 (jiā, "home/family") = Roof + Pig The component   宝盖   (the "roof" radical) represents a pigsty or shelter, while   豕 ...