One wrong stroke and it's done. There is no undo button, no white paint to correct any error, no second chance on that very point. To the majority of beginners that fact is a cold spill of water on day one. Read more here: https://www.thetingology.com/%E9%85%92%E7%B2%BE%E5%A2%A8%E6%B0%B4%E8%AA%B2%E7%A8%8B
Good. It is in that learning begins.
It is no exaggeration of the word to call this a hobby. Students usually highlight the experience as being more of picking up chess, easy as it is to start, but rich enough to spend a lifetime in. The instruments are initially alien. The bamboo brushes bend in unusual directions. The ink soaks washi paper like it is thirsty. Stick ground does not act as a tube paint does.
All is forced to be learned afresh.
The majority of the people come with an image on their mind; idyllic cherry trees, perhaps a tranquil koi fish. What they find is a practice that is obsessive with without. The unpainted areas breathe. They balance. They speak. What was omitted is life and death of a good composition.
This is how Sumi-e has worked over hundreds of years, the Zen concepts of economy and purpose. Nothing wasted. Nothing excessive. A whole grove of bamboo was implied by five or six characters. A landing bird taken in the bend of one line. The same uncomfortable question is always put by instructors: what can you take away?
The first month of students is at brush pressure. A slight draw on the paper will give us a slender, impalement line, and this, beautiful in the proper place, is maddeningly uneven everywhere else. Shaking it too hard causes blood to spurt out in all directions. The controlled stroke exists somewhere in that thin strip between those two extremities, and it is truly impossible to locate it over and over again.
Then, after one session, without a lot of fuss, it becomes possible not to feel impossible.
Those who remain students are persistent in one thing, and that is, they are curious and not frustrated. Some come in too exhausted on acrylics or watercolour and fed up with mediums that allow careless work to pass. They desire something that will put them to task.
Everyone is held responsible by ink painting.
The classical courses are developed around four main topics plum blossom, orchid, bamboo, chrysanthemum. The lesson learned by each plant is different. Plum blossom is concerning structure and negative space. Orchid evolves continuous and flowing line work. Repetition and rhythm of bamboo trains. Chrysanthemum is a patient plant that has stratified texture. Listening to each of the four and a little more, something changes permanently in your reading any visual image.
Everything is also silently influenced by material choice. The level of ink and the response to it can hardly be found in bottled alternatives, and freshly ground ink is deeper and more responsive. The thickness of paper, its texture as well as sizing all define the manner in which a stroke is landed.