Introduction & Inspiration.

Lunar New Year has long been one of my favorite holidays! As this year marks my last year in high school, it was also time for me to wave goodbye to one of my favorite traditions: painting couplets and lanterns. While work piled up in my senior year, I found painting to be enjoyable leisure that soothes my soul. I sought inspiration from the couplets written by underclassmen—my job was merely to decorate the Chinese calligraphy they had already beautifully created. The red couplets were first printed by underclassmen with Chinese calligraphy, which are poetic lines that could either describe a scenery, constitute a blessing typically said during CNY, or anything else.

Preparation & Action.

One of the couplets I painted on reads “柳綠花紅紫燕來，風和日麗春天到,” which translate into something along the lines of “willows turning green, flowers blossoming, and birds chirping; it was the arrival of spring.” This one could be seen on the third slide in the presentation below. For example, since I never painted willows before, I decided to make observations in real life (not pictured here) and imprint the image in my mind as a reference. As shown on the couplet on the left on the third slide, the willow leaves do not follow the most realistic dark-green color as seen in real life. Instead, I added some highlights in the color of mint/tiffany blue to make the willow tree more lively. There were two reasons why I took this approach. First, since the background is red, painting dark-green with watercolor will most likely create a brownish overtone. Second, I think the addition of new colors can make the willow tree pop on the couplet as opposed to having a rather dull image.

cny by Sunny Fang