Chinese Painting Techniques for Exquisite Watercolors!
Combine painting traditions for breathtaking results!
In this gorgeously illustrated book, Lian leads you on a fascinating exploration. You'll learn to blend aspects of Eastern and Western watercolor arts to capture the essence of your animal subjects--their defining features, overall shape and motion. In doing so, you'll notice a new poetry take hold in your artwork...expressive brushwork...an elegant, powerfully descriptive simplicity that is the hallmark of Chinese painting.

Learn New Materials & Techniques
You'll start by comparing the tools and techniques of eastern vs. western painting. Learn how to use materials such as raw Shuan (rice) paper compared to cold press watercolor paper, and mature Shuan paper compared with hot press watercolor paper. Illustrated sequences show you exactly how to use the Chinese watercolor brush, a topic rarely covered in workshops or books. Begin with the basics of holding the brush in the traditional manner, loading it with multiple colors, blending the ink and controlling the water. (Get Lian's companion video or dvd to see his brush in action!)

Lian presents a fun and unique approach to achieving watercolors filled with life and energy...
* Follow his tips on composition for a graceful and comfortable arrangement of objects in your paintings.
* Let Lian help you create subjects that communicate so that your painting has strong visual interaction, and perhaps even a story.
* Lian shows you how to paint detailed, layered fur without getting muddy results.
* Create beautiful backgrounds with Lian's 'Blowing to Paint' technique achieved by pouring your paint and then literally blowing it across the surface.
* Learn to load your brush with multiple colors for a spontaneous, immediate painting style.
* Learn to control the power of values.

Includes 17 Demonstrations!
The bulk of this book is devoted to 17 graceful animal-painting demonstrations. Follow along to evoke squirrels, tigers, horses, elephants, turtle, egrets, frogs, dogs, crab, rooster, cats and other animals using both Chinese and traditional watercolor techniques.

East Meets West
A native of China, Lian Quan Zhen teaches workshops around the world, as well as watercolor and sketching classes at U.C. Berkeley. Equally comfortable using both traditional Chinese painting materials and techniques as well as those of Western watercolor, Lian Zhen's work is a masterful, magical combination of both...a truly fresh and distinctive style. In this book he offers you a taste of the same creative joy, drawing you into the enchanting world of Chinese painting.

Above all, you'll discover ways of integrating Chinese painting techniques into your personal painting style to create harmonious scenes, capture a sense of life, and achieve vibrant effects in a few, very powerful strokes.