Most of my Tai Chi students train very diligently once a week and are progressing very well. I have some students who train a couple of times per week. Robert Lyne has recently completed his Suang Yang form. Well done. Christine Pirrie who trains on Monday evenings and Wednesday lunch times has now also completed her Suang Yang form. Well done also, Félicitations. To have passed the Suang Yang form to two students gives me great pleasure.

Teaching Tai Chi is a huge responsibility and not one to be taken lightly. The internal art forms require a great deal of careful study and attention. I passed my Suang Yang Instructor’s grading many years ago, but since then I have continued to train with my Instructor, the Chief Instructor. I discuss the form, Chi Kung exercises and the needs of my students continually. It is very important to be able to access Mr Suthern’s knowledge and thirty years of experience. This way I can provide my students with the best teaching standards and make sure that they are safe and happy.

Both Robert and Christine are excellent examples of diligent Tai Chi students. They also understand the importance of training regularly and asking questions and practicing at home.

I thoroughly enjoy teaching in Worthing, Arundel and Shoreham and providing a high standard of Instructorship with the backup of my Instructor who takes a great interest in all the students.

Shafagh Amiraftabi

Instructor WCMA

^{Gardner St and Kensington Gardens are known for being very colourful and bohemian, so a Lion Dance fitted in perfectly!}

^{Fortunately the weather held again and the Lion looked beautiful as it paraded up and down the lanes, as you can see from the photos in the gallery section.}

^{It was great fun to perform the dances and watch how the Lion interacted with the crowd. In the morning Shaf was performing in the head and Jason Lee in the tail. In the afternoon Josh Haigh performed in the head and Jason Lee in the tail. Rick Walker and Asha Lang were the musicians on the day. A special well done to Asha for her first Lion Dance at the age of 10.}

^{If you are interested in the products Pearls sell, their website is:}

^{www.pearlsbrighton.com}

^{If you are interested in Lion Dance, please call me on:}

^{07885 963979.}

Mr Russell Suthern

Chief Instructor WCMA

In the master class Shaf introduced us to the script now commonly used which is ‘Kai Shu’. We started on a brief history of the various scripts used in Chinese Calligraphy and moved on to the equipment or what is known as “The four treasures of a scholar’s study” which are the paper, brush, ink and ink stone which all work in partnership to create the perfect brushstroke which is the heart of calligraphy.

We were shown how to load and care for our brushes, how to prepare our ink and various other ways in treating our equipment, what surprised me was the dedication within the preparation of the equipment which demands the utmost perfection and decides the outcome of the final piece. As it’s said failure to prepare is preparing to fail.

We practiced 1 to 10 using various methods, from the order of the strokes, how the strokes are formed, to the dedication in a single stroke, I hope now you can understand that Chinese calligraphy is easier said than done, my work provided with this article took me weeks, and it still lacks Balance in certain characters and the spontaneous strokes that make the characters come alive or “dance across the paper” as some critics would say. However like Martial Arts Chinese calligraphy cannot be mastered in a day and is a lifelong effort to obtain what the Chinese call the supreme expression of Chinese culture due to its fusion of poetry, literature and painting.

We may here that Chinese Calligraphy and Chinese Martial Arts are practiced to improve each other but how is this? It’s easier experienced than said and is why I urge you to attend at least one of these master classes, Brush strokes are not painted but formed with various movements of the elbow and wrist found throughout our patterns but more predominantly in the Suang Yang form. When practicing your form you are also practicing your calligraphy and vice versa, furthermore as mentioned by our instructors, scholars where martial artists but like most ancient cultures only the clever, or higher echelons of society could write, and therefore studied calligraphy, they were further expected to study both the paths of the warrior (martial artist) and the harmonised path of the tactician (scholar).

It is also said the brush is the extension of the body just like our weapons, and to perform the perfect brushstroke or well-balanced one that contains ‘spirit’ one must use their ‘Qi’, muscles in the body are to coarse for a perfect brushstroke and so one must use their Qi to obtain the perfect stroke, this as we know, is obtained via our study of Martial Arts.

I am very grateful that Shaf has provided us with these classes as doing this article I have discovered something that I Hear both Mr Russell Suthern, our Chief Instructor, and Shaf say about keeping the system alive, during my research I have uncovered a problem in the East known as “Character Amnesia” where due to westernization and technological advancement of the world Chinese people are beginning to forget how to write the characters, therefore schools are encouraging more calligraphy to prevent this from happening, whether or not this is becoming an increasing problem is under debate but how sad would it be if you sat before a piece of paper and could not remember how to write your own name?

I will cut this article short as I could sit here and type about Chinese Calligraphy all day, but as a last note I encourage you to look into a man called ‘Ba Desheng’ from Kaifeng city in Henan province, who infuses his Kung Fu with his calligraphy to form huge water creations on a pavement, check out the size of his brush!

White Crane calligraphy by Mark Cunningham

Worthing WCMA

Recently she has relocated her shop to Rock St in Kemp town and launched a new website to promote her business.

To celebrate this auspicious occasion, White Crane Martial Arts were proud to perform a double Lion Dance to bless the new shop and bring luck to the business.

Despite the dire weather warnings, the sun gods shined down upon us and it remained dry for the duration of the dance.

The two Lions looked extremely colourful in the bright sunlight and everybody loved the dance.

Shaf and Kirsty were in the Gold Lion and Josh and Jason were in the Red Lion. Both pairs worked really hard to bring their Lions to life and thrill the audience. The photos of the event can be seen in the gallery section.

Louisa sells all kinds of Chinese ornaments, calligraphy and so forth. She had brought in some puppets based on the Chinese Lions which we could not resist buying! Photos of these little creatures can also be seen in the gallery.

If you are interested in contacting Louisa regarding her selection, her details are as follows:

Tel: 01273 819 168

Web: www.orientalartsbrighton.co.uk

This is just the first of many Lion Dances we have booked up for the summer season and I’m really looking forward to our next performance!

Russell Suthern

Chief Instructor WCMA