This morning I got the message that the ladies of the art group have organised a next meeting on Wednesday to start in early in the morning. So the taxi has to be in front of the gallery at 8am. This gives a good feeling because the last few days as well my brain as my body was under a lot of tension. But this is something I created myself with my ideas about this exhibition. On the other hand I know that such a situation generates a lot of new ideas, may be even to much.
One of my intentions already was to do ‘something’ with paper in this show because the art on paper plays an important role in the old Chinese culture. Therefore I started this morning to make small water-colours on paper I had brought with me from home. For my exhibition I want to show them in a block on one of the big walls.

But this afternoon I had to leave this work for some shopping. The group needs paper on Wednesday and I wanted to buy some special paper material in connection to the ‘something’ I mentioned above. So off again to the material shops in front of the central art academy of Beijing. Because there are a lot of students and also a lot of artists in the town there are also a lot of these shops in a concentration that we don’t know in the Netherlands. It’s really unbelievable, all the stuff you can buy here. And not only the stuff is unbelievable, also most of the prices. This is really something to get very greedy! I had to control myself, otherwise I would have bought too much.
After that we thought it a good idea to bring a short visit to the academy on the other side of the street while our driver, we asked for the same we had a couple of days ago, was waiting patiently. However, the short visit became a much longer one, not only because it’s not so difficult to get lost in this huge complex but also because we found their shop. This was again an opportunity to get greedy. So many beautiful and interesting books, unfortunately only in Chinese! But nevertheless it was clear that the students here are educated in the old fashioned skills of the job, a situation that hardly can be found in the Netherlands nowadays. You understand I had to buy a few books that I’m going to integrate in the show. But how? Well the next few days will give the solution.

Now it’s dinnertime and in China that’s not a bad time. Till now the food has been very good, as well in the more expensive restaurants as in the plain local family restaurants we have visited. When you have tasted the food and seen the prices you would be crazy to cook for yourself in the kitchen of the gallery. Think about it: last night we had a very good dinner with four people for nearly 4 €! That’s a reason to tell more about this but not now. Now still art is the main course.