Los Gatos Weekly-Times Photograph by George Sakkestad Artist Anne King Leong is one of the artists featured in the current exhibit at the Tait Museum. She is standing in front of one of her works. Tait offers 'In the Yin-Yang Circle' By Shari Kaplan Departing from its usual Western art, the Los Gatos Museum of Fine Art and Natural History presents "In the Yin-Yang Circle," an exhibit of five Asian American artists. In addition to brush paintings, the exhibit includes Asian artifacts restored by collector Margaret Foote and also includes an uchikake--an elaborate Japanese kimono historically worn by upper-class women and brides--on loan from Los Gatans Betsy and Sam Oka. According to Anne King Leong of San Jose, Chinese brush painting encompasses three main categories, which she details in her book Introduction to Chinese Brush Painting, available at the museum. These categories are fine- line, imagistic and impressionistic paintings. Traditional tools of the trade include brushes of animal hair or shredded bamboo, ink from ground ink sticks, grinding stones, rice or cotton paper, a water container and a color palette--preferably in natural hues. An art instructor both privately and for schools and adult education programs, Leong says people must have three attributes to become painters: interest, patience and willingness to practice. Since she was an elementary schoolgirl in Hong Kong, Leong has always loved painting, and always had these traits. They also came in handy when she raised her family. "When my children were young, I was busy all day. In the middle of the night, it was so quiet, I could paint all night long. When they got older, I'd paint from morning to evening," she says, recalling how sometimes she got so caught up in her art that she forgot it was dinnertime. Among her favorite images are landscapes, bamboo, flowers and animals--especially horses and cats. The first three images are considered more traditional in Chinese brush painting, Leong explains, and are similar to still-life. Animals are a more "modern" subject because they carry a sense of action, and sometimes personality. "Horses are really hard to paint. I have to go to the countryside to see how they move and how they run. The hardest thing to catch with animals is their movement," she says. D.C. Wong captures people in his paintings, with a preference for lithe young women with captivating features. Painted with sharp details and bright colors, including gold, these include "Mind Traveler," "Hungry Eyes" and "Ocean Thoughts." Even sharper detail comes out in Shirley Chen's "Peony Blossom," a bright, exquisite portrait of multicolored blooms and gilt-winged butterflies. In contrast is her "Tranquility," a softly hued painting of a waterway whose banks are covered with willows. A fisherman sitting in a boat is the only element to break the stillness. Zhunwang Zhao prefers landscapes, as evidenced in "Rain in the Mountains," "Site: Lake Tahoe," "Southern Yangtze River" and other natural images. Chun-Hui "Caroline" Yu's paintings center around bamboo and flowers. She also paints traditional vertically themed scenes, as in "Spring Shower," which depicts a small home with lanky tree branches above it and high mountains rising in the distance at the top of the canvas. The Los Gatos Museum of Fine Art and Natural History, at 4 Tait Ave, is open from noon to 4 p.m., Wednesday through Sunday. [ Back to Contents Page | Los Gatos Weekly-Times Home Page | Archives ] This article appeared in the Los Gatos Weekly-Times, December 23, 1998. ©1998 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.