Far East Painting in Hahnemühle – Creative Seminar on the Japanese art of Sumi-e Painting in Dassel

The bamboo stalk is painted with a fast, decisive move of the black brush, the bamboo leaves – with delicate dabbing … the Sumi-e painting is created by meditative immersion in the motif. So far, the precious paper for Oriental painting purposes was imported directly from Japan. Hahnemühle FineArt GmbH has developed a special Paper which can meet the exacting requirements of the Sumi-e technique. At the same time, the company offers one of the few seminars on this exotic painting technique held in Germany.

„Sumi” means literally „black ink”; and „e” can be interpreted as both „the way” or “painting”. Pictures painted in that style are simple, aesthetic and characterized by powerful, mostly chasing and rapidly executed lines. Those who master the difficult art of Sumi-e painting, create their works in the atmosphere of inner peace and meditative harmony. In this way, they can create paintings reflecting the nature of the motif. Bamboo is one of the most frequent themes.

Seminars on this exotic painting technique are not held often in Germany.
The Hahnemühle FineArt GmbH offers – as part of its Creative Atelier activities – the opportunity to learn the secrets of this art of painting. The course is given by a master of the Sumi-e technique, from 20th to 22nd May 2005, and from 21st to 23rd October 2005, at the company headquarters in Dassel (Southern Lower Saxony). The participants are first informed about the paper production technologies employed in the paper mill, which is one of Germany’s oldest and most traditional paper mills. Next, the seminar itself begins with a demonstration delivered by Ms. Rita Böhm from Berlin, a Sumi-e master. From the second day of the seminar, the participants learn the painting technique in three steps. Firstly, they practice the clean brush strokes, which are the basis for Sumi-e painting. Next, they are able to try their hand at copying a painting of the seminar's leader, in order to better remember the aesthetics of Sumi-e painting. During the third, final phase, the participants create their own pictures of motifs from the classical Sumi-e canon.

This exotic painting technique is recommended primarily to untrained artists, as they have not yet mastered any specific brush-holding habits. In Sumi-e painting, contrary to other painting techniques, the brush is held almost perpendicular to the paper surface. The paper is extremely thin, but at the same time very absorbent, which allows water to penetrate deeper than the ink. Thanks to this, sharp edges are possible in addition to soft drawings. The paper also shows up the structure of brush strokes very well.