Overview

In the western world, black and white portraits are usually drawn with pencil, charcoal or pen, but in the far east, ink wash, which is a traditional Chinese painting technique, is good for drawing portraits as well. In this book, all 46 U.S. presidents are drawn using Chinese brush ( ) and Chinese ink ( ). While the best paper for ink wash is the paper made of bamboo, common watercolor paper can also be suitable. Ink wash technique is similar to water color technique. When the portrait of each president is presented in this book, a small poem is also presented to describe the president's unique character. The poem is in the form of couplet. Couplet is a special form of Chinese poetry. A couplet is composed of two lines, the upper line (the first line or the independent line) and the down line (the second line or the coupling line). The independent line is free in length (or number of words), in part of speech and in meaning, while the coupling line should be strictly coupled to the independent line with the same length, the same of part of speech and the same or similar or opposite meaning. Take the couplet for George Washington for example, which reads: Opened the territory of thousands of miles with a five-foot sword, And Left his virtue to hundreds of generations with one-time abdication. In this couplet, open and leave is a couple, territory and virtue is a couple, thousands and hundreds is a couple, miles and generations is a couple, five-foot and one-time is a couple, sword and abdication is a couple. This couple would be translated to Chinese as , . It is a fairly good couplet. In China, couplets can be seen everywhere, from elegant mansions to ordinary homes, from wedding parties to funeral ceremonies, and from shopping centers to playhouses. Famous figures in history are usually commented or commended in couplet. Both ink wash and couplet demonstrated in this book are parts of traditional Chinese culture.

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