Lotus Pond

Lin Yu-shan painted a wide variety of subjects. He also was renowned for his realist style and for the characters in his paintings giving off a natural ordinary feel. This work is representative of his style. To capture the moment in the early morning when the lotus flowers are at their most beautiful, he found a big lotus pond in rural Chia-yi and visited it on many occasions to paint from life. In terms of composition, the painting is separated into two parts from top left to bottom right. In the painting the lotus leaves are fully open and a dewdrop is ready to fall from the leaf. The flowers are either in bloom or ready to bloom and are lovely to behold. The feeding egret seems to make ripples. Below the water surface, water weeds and small fish can be seen. The leaves are blue and mineral green, the flowers are bright red and the water is gold, giving the picture a rich elegant feel.(Hsueh,Yen-ling)