by Susan Rosefielde

Spring semester started out as high adventure for me as I accompanied my husband, UNC economics professor Steven Rosefielde, on a six-month jaunt to Asia.

We were headed to Nanjing, China, to teach at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center for International Studies. We departed for Bangkok on a snowy morning in late January and arrived in tropical Southeast Asia for a month of visiting historic sites in Thailand, Cambodia and Burma, before settling down to teaching life in Nanjing.

But that is another story. My tale here is about the extraordinary experience of studying traditional Chinese painting in the tiny apartment of Dai Xue Yan. Our meeting was arranged by Dorothy Ko, resident scholar at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center and professor at Barnard College in New York City. I was interviewed for four hours, so that Mr. Dai could decide whether I was sufficiently serious about studying Chinese art to take me on as a student.

I was warned at the start that I would have to subject myself to the rigors of a Chinese education. Each class would be four hours long, and I would have to bring the same interpreter with me each time. I was told that hobbyists were not welcome. I tried to impress Mr. Dai with my interest and studies in Asian art, which began with classes at Harvard in 1968 with noted scholars professors Loehr and Coolidge.

I explained to Mr. Dai that I had been a committed artist since childhood, with a lifetime of painting, teaching and exhibiting and was a trained and practicing art historian. In preparation for making my semester abroad worthwhile, I formulated a plan that included finding a master painter, learning traditional landscapes techniques and inquiring into the metaphysical nature of the "void" in Chinese painting.

Lesson one laid out the plan of our study. Though I was interested in the loose style of landscape painting, I had to begin with and understand the discipline of calligraphy. The physical stress of holding the brush in the unaccustomed Chinese manner proved that mind over body was of great import. Breath control and body movements, akin to tai chi, were embodied in the principles of calligraphy.

The Chinese do not paint a picture; they write a picture. Every line is carefully controlled and must embody movement and counter movement. Between classes I was assigned homework because calligraphy every day keeps the doctor away, as my translator informed me.

Lesson two moved on to the classic style of portraiture, and I copied portions of a Song Dynasty court painting. I was introduced to "gong bi" (literally, labor brush), a hard-line ultra-realistic style that involved building up transparent washes and careful, rather tedious blending in. My results turned out not at all badly. I'm glad, because I spent eight hours on my homework.

Lesson three advanced to the Flower and Bird school of painting in the same painstaking "gong bi" manner. At this point I gave up counting homework hours and considered the degree of neck strain. Lessons were so long that we paused for breaks of dumplings, fruit and tea.

Mr. Dai considered canceling classes because of the SARS epidemic. Understandably, he was reluctant to have visitors come to his home. Having our lives and teaching thrown into ever-changing flux because of the disease was acceptable, but I didn't want to give up my lessons, especially before we had the opportunity to discuss the "void."

I didn't exactly beg, but I asked him to reconsider, and suggested we could wear masks and meet at my apartment. We moved on to landscapes, with discussions about monolithic mountains, feng shui, literally wind and water, that is, things that flow, including the energies of the universe.

Ultimately we came to Yin and Yang, the opposites of the universe. Mr. Dai posited that "wu" (the void) and "kong" (the space) were examples of opposites and had to live in harmony within the frame of a painting. As with reality and imagination, they are opposites, always interfacing and seeking a balance. Mr. Dai offered that void and space came from Buddhist doctrines, not very mystical, but wise and practical. Like existence, which is always changing, Chinese characters and painting embody great variety and complement each other. Thickness of lines, speed of execution and amount of ink are in a living relationship with the water, brush and paper.

We compressed 10 classes, over 40 hours, into four weeks. Our last lesson included dinner at his home with our spouses and Dr. Ko

seven people around a 24-inch round table, sitting on chairs, stools and what-have-you. But the food, company and conversation were grand. We completed the evening by viewing his paintings and said our good-byes after eight long hours.

My last week in Nanjing ended unexpectedly early. The Hopkins-Nanjing program was cut short because of threat of illness and ended April 29 instead of June 20. I spent three days and 16 hours in Mr. Dai's studio. The speed and stress didn't allow much time to evaluate what I had learned. That would have to wait until I was comfortably back in my Chapel Hill studio.

Cutline(s): After returning from China, Rosefielde's work included looser strokes and more intense color saturation.