Dehiscense i Painting

This image is one of a series of ink paintings I made on my return from a life changing expereience at the Tao Hua Tan artists residency in the beautiful district of Anhui, China. I joined a group of amazing international artists immersed in the spectacular landscape of verdant hills, rivers and lakes at the foot of the Yellow Mountain range. The covid years and strict lockdown policies had taken their toll on the studios, but I loved the way nature had encroached and reclaimed the buildings. The area was also famous for its production of rice paper and for the many famous chinese ink painters and poets who had been inspired by the natural beauty of the area. It was a hot and steamy weather and this added to the exotic feel of the place. Dehiscence means the splitting or bursting open of a pod or fruit. These images seemed like a natural repsonse to the fertile flora and forna that surrounded my studio.