A Foreigner Invents a Bizarre Gadget to Spread Chinese Calligraphy

Chinese water calligraphy¹ is often seen as a hobby of elderly Chinese men. Every morning, elderly men gather in Beijing's parks to practice this ancient art on the ground with giant brushes dipped in water, writing fluid lines of ancient characters that disappear one by one as they dry.

Many take it up as a hobby after retirement² to train their concentration and precision.

But today let's follow our reporter Wei Tong to meet with a young foreigner who is now bringing water calligraphy back to the streets of Beijing.

 
Nicholas Hanna, a Canadian media artist living in Beijing, has invented a tricycle that writes Chinese characters with water.

His calligraphy-mobile is based around a tricycle with a palette similar to those used by the salesmen and waste collectors who trundle around the city's traditional "hutong" alleyways.

An Apple laptop mounted on the handlebars uses software Hanna designed himself to transform Chinese characters into a series of signals that are sent to electromagnetic valves at the back of the tricycle.

From these valves come drops of water which fall on the ground to make characters, or words from any language in fact, as the vehicle moves.

His bizarre contraption has been puzzling local residents since it made its maiden³ voyage two weeks ago at the opening of Beijing design week. Hanna explains.

"So the idea for this project comes from when I first arrived in Beijing and I started going to the parks here. And if you go to the parks, you will find generally older people. They are doing water calligraphy. They have these really long brushes and they dip them in a bucket of water and they write Chinese calligraphy on the ground. And so I thought this is a really interesting thing. I thought it's really beautiful and I decided⁴ to build the machine."

Beijing residents are familiar with water calligraphy, but have never seen anything like the tricycle before.

"I think it's quite interesting that a foreigner has designed such a tricycle. It writes 'long live the communist party' and 'China is great'. It's very interesting and innovative⁵. This foreigner shows his creativity in China. It's all quite new. We really like it."

Twenty-six-year-old Zhang Xinzhe was distracted by the machine as she passed through the area, which is popular with tourists.

"This foreigner came to China from thousands of miles away. I think first of all he must have an in-depth understanding of Chinese culture. Secondly⁶, he must also have a good understanding of Chinese characters. So that's why he could invent such a high-tech⁷ machine."

The art is temporary. Like those written by the elderly men in the park, Hanna's characters only live for a few brief moments before drying up and disappearing.

But the image of one foreigner and his outlandish machine rolling down the alleyways is unlikely to fade from the minds of all those who see it.

For CRI, this is Wei Tong.

1 calligraphy   

n.书法

参考例句：

• At the calligraphy competition,people asked him to write a few characters.书法比赛会上，人们请他留字。
• His calligraphy is vigorous and forceful.他的书法苍劲有力。

2 retirement   

n.退休，退职

参考例句：

• She wanted to enjoy her retirement without being beset by financial worries.她想享受退休生活而不必为金钱担忧。
• I have to put everything away for my retirement.我必须把一切都积蓄起来以便退休后用。

3 maiden   

n.少女，处女；adj.未婚的，纯洁的，无经验的

参考例句：

• The prince fell in love with a fair young maiden.王子爱上了一位年轻美丽的少女。
• The aircraft makes its maiden flight tomorrow.这架飞机明天首航。

4 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

5 innovative   

adj.革新的，新颖的，富有革新精神的

参考例句：

• Discover an innovative way of marketing.发现一个创新的营销方式。
• He was one of the most creative and innovative engineers of his generation.他是他那代人当中最富创造性与革新精神的工程师之一。

6 secondly   

adv.第二，其次

参考例句：

• Secondly,use your own head and present your point of view.第二，动脑筋提出自己的见解。
• Secondly it is necessary to define the applied load.其次，需要确定所作用的载荷。

7 high-tech   

adj.高科技的

参考例句：

• The economy is in the upswing which makes high-tech services in more demand too.经济在蓬勃发展，这就使对高科技服务的需求量也在加大。
• The quest of a cure for disease with high-tech has never ceased. 人们希望运用高科技治疗疾病的追求从未停止过。