Ink wash, or water-ink, painting technique is an artisticpractice that originated in China and spread throughEast Asia, becoming popular in Japan and Korea. Ink wash painting is known as shuimohua in China, which is pronounced as sumukhwa in Korea. The technique is called sumi-e in Japan.
The essential components include an ink brush, inkstone, inkstick, and xuan
paper. Known as the “Four Treasures of a Scholar’s Studio,” these were the tools required for calligraphy, and painting emanated from this tradition.
The ink brush is typically a round, tapered animal hair brush with a bamboo handle. Occasionally these handles are made of more valuable materials like jade or ivory. The inkstone is a mortar to which one adds water and then grinds the inkstick against it,
combining the two to produce ink. The stone also has an area to store the paint after it has been made. The inkstick itself is made of soot and animal glue, formed
into a solid stick or cake.
Xuan is the final component; it is a soft, absorbent paper well-suited for ink painting.
Typically referred to as rice paper, the name is misleading. The paper often contains bamboo, hemp, and mulberry bark, not rice.
Any additional color needed for paintings is made by combining ground
minerals or vegetable dyes with animal glue and water to create washes of pigment.
Once the materials are assembled, the painters need to master handling the brush with nimbleness to produce lines of various lengths and widths. Practitioners describe the calm and mental acuity necessary to balance the appropriate amount of water and ink on the brush, and then wield it with the necessary pressure
and speed.
Though figural studies exist, landscapes and nature scenes dominate the field of ink brush painting. Such scenes can be representational as well as symbolic, commenting on humankind’s relationship with nature.
