Through teaching the history of Chinese landscape painting, I have two main takeaways that apply to my work that I'll tie back to:

The expressive potential of landscapes - they can be packed with emotions.
The relationship between writing and painting on one shared surface.

First, why do you write on your paintings?

Writing on the surface of a painting about the rainy weather or which artists the brush strokes mimic isn't common practice in western art so this painting+writing combination needs a quick background overview.

In Chinese painting, there's a big range in content of inscriptions from briefly describing the circumstances of the day to connecting the scene or location to a historical event. This connection to location/historical event will be clearer when I describe my work.

For example, in these two paintings by Wang Hui (1632–1717):

Leaf E from an album by Wang Hui (Chinese, 1632–1717). Image from MET Museum.

**Top left inscription:**
"*Mountain torrent and deserted mountain path; through old trees to a village’s bramble gate."* 澗水空山道，柴門老樹村。
*"Using the brush manner of Juran [active ca. 960–85] to evoke the poetic ideas of Shaoling" [Du Fu, 712–770]* 用巨然筆寫少陵詩意。

Top left inscription includes:

Description of the place: "Mountain torrent and deserted mountain path; through old trees to a village’s bramble gate."
Explicit shoutouts to artist & poet from other turmoiled times similar to Wang Hui's: "Using the brush manner of Juran [active ca. 960–85] to evoke the poetic ideas of Shaoling" [Du Fu, 712–770]

Leaf J from the same album as the first piece, also by Wang Hui. Image from MET Museum

**Top left inscription includes same as above (place + artist reference):**
"*Mountain Village after Snow, after Vice Minister Wang"* [Wang Wei, 701–761] 山莊雪霽，倣右丞。

Top right inscription includes:

Who commissioned it: "Yanweng Laoren [Wang Shimin] gave me a blank album and asked for some paintings. At the time I was traveling in Weiyang [Yangzhou] and was not able to comply. This spring I received an urgent letter [from him] so I quickly did these small scenes after various masters. Your disciple's embarrassing brush and ink is not worthy of entering your collection."
Date and weather: "Done by a rainy window on the fifth day of the second [lunar] month of the jiayin year [March 5, 1674]."
Who painted it: "Your pupil, Wang Hui of Yushan."

煙翁老先生以素冊命畫，翬時游維揚未能即應。今年春飛書見，速率倣諸家小景呈正。第愧筆墨醜惡，不堪溷入清閟耳。甲寅二月五日雨窗識。虞山後學王翬

For more info on the stories of Chinese painting based on inscriptions, read this excellent MET Museum article!

Especially during turbulent political change (like Wang Hui's time), there's often anguish and longing evident within the heaviness of the piece within the subject. The emotion is also seen in the inscriptions - in the references to another artist from an earlier dynasty. These referenced artists were sometimes ones known for living during similarly difficult circumstances.

So how do Chinese landscapes relate?

For the Psalm 73 series (consisting of 3 paintings so far), I've applied both takeaways from above in the writing and painting.

The expressive potential of landscapes - they can be packed with emotions.
The relationship between writing and painting on one shared surface (which is my focus for writing today).

The inscription above the landscapes are excerpts of Psalm 73, included in English at the end of the post. They are about the presence and strength of God as the psalmist's refuge. I wondered what "presence" and "strength" look like in suffering when those traits are harder to see.

The places I painted are important historical sites of Japanese Catholics who continued an underground tradition for centuries (about 250 years until the mid-19th century). These sites are places of torture, martyrdom, and worship. One site known for where underground Christians were captured became a site to collect holy water. How can a terrible past transform to a holy place? Is it still a terrible place based on the events that happened there? Or is it now a holy place? Is it possible that it can be both?

Studying the history of Japanese Catholics first brought waves of doubt. These weren't new doubts. It's been a journey of faith to choose what to believe in when I don't understand the circumstances - usually tragic ones. If I pray and believe with all my soul for someone to survive or to believe, and the outcome is neither, then what do I make of that? I have wondered, like they did, was my prayer heard at all?

How can it be that for 250+ years, these people had to suffer, be tortured, and even killed along with neighbors and families simply for holding on to their faith? I saw this as a reflection of God more than a reflection of man's fear. My thinking was black and white, just like thinking a place can only be tragic or sacred, not both at once.

The important connection developing in my mind and faith over the years are that both seemingly incompatible facts can be true.

There is terrible suffering that I can't understand from my perspective, but in that suffering these words in Psalm 73 can still be true, much like a place can be both tragic and sacred.

In fact, without that tragedy the place would never have become sacred. Similarly, without weakness, failure, and fear, there would be no consolation from Psalm 73.

Nevertheless I am continually with You;
You have taken hold of my right hand.
With Your counsel You will guide me,
And afterward receive me to glory.

Whom have I in heaven but You?
And besides You, I desire nothing on earth.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
For, behold, those who are far from You will perish;
You have destroyed all those who are unfaithful to You.
But as for me, the nearness of God is my good;
I have made the Lord God my refuge,
That I may tell of all Your works.

[Psalm 73:23-28]