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Local artist shares passion for Sum-é painting and Tai-Chi

September 28, 2023   ·   0 Comments

By Constance Scrafield

Sum-é artist Roslyn Levin is working on a few of her traditional Japanese art paintings as submissions for an art show in Luxembourg.

She told the Citizen, “I had seen it a few years ago and thought of submitting but didn’t feel ready. Almost always the winning paintings are avant-garde or strange stuff and I thought maybe they’d like a break.”

There are a number of expectations for works submitted to this European art exhibition and those are for the artist to write the story, explain the content, context with reference to history; from literature.

“I just tell them a little more about sum-é as I go along,” she claimed, wondering if her novel approach to Luxembourg will appeal to them.

Circle Arts Magazine hosting an online gallery and promotion, brought Ms. Levin’s art in previously and again this year. She was clear she is not a person who likes to sell art on line, noting that you can’t see the brush strokes with oil and acrylic. When Covid–19 pressured galleries to stage the first shows on line, Ms. Levin observed many paintings were not always as well done when seen in reality.

Yet, nowadays, she informed us, “All shows require work to be submitted electronically.”

Currently, she is hoping to be an Artist-in-Residence in Japan, which she has yet to visit. She wants to take a sum-é painting of her own and incorporate it from something natural from Japan, like hanging it from the branch of a native tree.

“You look at what they’re looking for – to give the artist a chance,” she said about the idea.

Her ideal is Nara, Japan for that is from where sum-é came in Japan; there are places that make paint and ink and brushes. It is a chance to soak up the culture.

Ms. Levin admitted that she has been studying the Japanese language but it is very difficult. More than 40 years ago, she met and studied sum-é under Tomoko Kodami at the Ottawa School of Art, very quickly discovering her passion for sum-é painting. Sum-é’s challenge is to create the figure as simply, with as few lines as possible. The great achievement is the painting being clear in just one line. Roslyn Levin has won multiple awards for her paintings and calligraphy. 

She added colour to her fall pieces and painted birds, horses, dogs with all the detail of their feather and fur, hanging on to the ideals while including her own vision too. Cats are actually her main love to paint.

What occupies her otherwise is Tai chi, which she learned in Ottawa beginning in 1984. Wanting to stay fit after her retirement from an office job, she took “dancercise.” A friend of hers was doing tai chi. She went to a class just to watch and knew this was indeed something to incorporate in her life.

She has learned the whole 108 steps.

Later on, she met a lady in Perth, Ont. who begged her to teach and she had a venue, etc.

“That’s when I began to teach tai chi,” Ms. Levin offered. “A lot of my students here have moved on after Covid and others are too senior to be able.”

Ms. Levin teaches Tai chi every Tuesday (students with some or good knowledge of tai-chi) and Thursday (students who are learning and those who can help). The age range, she laughed is – whoever comes, because of the time of day: from 9:30am to 10:30am Tuesday and Thursday mornings. Even for those who are well acquainted, going over it is helpful to remember the steps and small meditations.

It all begins with the Bow in the 108 and the 24 steps and gradually, you can do it.”

“In the summer I do the steps in a park. Last year my husband agreed to study tai chi.”

She has studied with several teachers in Toronto, in the U.S. but especially with Master Moy.
“I like sharing what I know,” she commented. “It’s very graceful; I’m teaching my Tuesday class to go slower and slower.”

Her art book, The Brush Dances is “completely available.”

“People love it,” she said. “It helped me understand what I do better and made me take something quite complex become simpler, although not having sensei (teacher).”

She considers herself a sensei because she is a sum-é teacher.

An incident with a dog in her youth made dogs the last image she is painting and last year she did paint dogs. A woman asked her to paint some more dogs for a show and she has one of them in the window of Dragonfly.

Just before Covid, she was asked to teach misty paintings. She developed building up the layers of colours to create beautiful effects.

How to price a piece of art, she answered saying she does it by the size rather than the length of time it took to create.

She eliminated the glass fronts to her paintings as glass can break and is heavy.

“I mount my paintings on birch plywood and paint them over with a semi gloss UV- protective acrylic medium but really, the paintings need no UV protection as the paintings never change.” she explained. 

Said Roslyn Levin, “I did ask my Japanese friends how they protect the paper and they answered: ‘We dust.’”

Most days, Ms. Levin is in her studio in Dragonfly at 189 Broadway. She is pleased to accept commissions.

And she is very pleased for anyone to join her Tai-chi classes. For more information, reach her at 519- 925-2401 and email: roslyn@artbyroslyn.on.ca.

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