Artist Yolanda Mayhall says she has always loved the simplicity and beauty of a good brush stroke. This fascination took root in the 1950s when she lived in Japan where her husband was stationed. From 1955 to 1961, Yolanda studied a Japanese brush painting technique called Sumi-e. "When I went to Japan, I could see the magnificent way of painting with simple brush strokes. I just became so entranced with the art that I studied it while I was there."

Using Sumi-e techniques she learned from Japanese masters Takeuchi and Saito, Yolanda creates lush landscapes with just a few brush strokes. In Sumi-e, everything's done in single brush strokes. It has to be done right the first time. It's sometimes accompanied by poetry . "Originally, Sumi-e was a Chinese art" she explained. "Then it spread all over the Eastern World." The Japanese have given it a very unique flavor. They have really styled it to suit their artistic expression. The Japanese starting using Sumi-e widely around the 6th century. She said Sumi-e is a sister art to Japanese calligraphy called Shodo.

In Japanese,"Sumi" means ink and the "e" means picture. Sumi-e paintings have an expressionistic quality about them that has led Yolanda to speculate about the influence this Japanese art may have had on European artists who introduced impressionism to the Western world in the late 19th century.

Yolanda believes early French impressionists artist discovered wood block art which are prepared primarily with Sumi-e work during the Paris Univeral Exposition in 1867. The 77-year-old artist has been teaching Sumi-e for forty-three years and is published with three books and many magazine articles. She has lectured and taught all over the U.S., Virgin Islands, Germany and Canada and is currently active in Florida.

"What I've done is taken the mystery out of it and shown that a brush stroke is a brush stroke no matter the culture." Recently, she released an instructional and inspirational video tape titled "A Sumi-e Dream Journey". In the video Yolanda reviews the basic brush strokes of Sumi-e paintings: bamboo, wild orchid, chrysanthemum and plum branch. They are called the "Four Gentlemen". First , she uses a few deft strokes, to create a sumi-e painting of bamboo. Then she paints another, this time explaining the process and each stroke needed to create the bamboo, complete with leaves, stalk and a little "YO" bird perched on the leaves. Yolanda follows this format with each of the Four Gentlemen, offering advice on each.

Finally, she takes viewers on a "dream journey", and encourages them to do the same after they have mastered the Four Gentlemen. "All of these stroke categories are necessary to create your personal "dream journey" paintings", she tells viewers. Yolanda explained that a sumi-e artist creates a dream journey from memories of beautiful places they have seen or imagined, not from a sketch or photograph. In the dream journey painting Yolanda creates for viewers, the bold stroke she uses to create a plum branch to produce a small mountain.The same strokes she used to paint bamboo are adapted to paint trees.

Yolanda 's books can be purchased from her studio, any bookstore in the U.S. or online. Her video, "A Sumi-e Dream Journey" can also be purchased online, from her studio or from the Flax art and design catalogue.

Ted Mayhall’s career in the art field centered in Commercial Art and the Federal Service. Calligraphy, typography and hand lettering entered all phases in his artistic career.

He studied musicology and is a graduate of Columbia Institute of Commercial Art and his art studies at American University and Corcoran Art School were under the direction of such world notables as Eugene Wiess, William Calfee, Dr. E. Mortimer, quondam typographic director of the U.S. Government Printing Office, and H. Watanabe, a Japanese Shodo (Japanese calligraphy) master during a 6-year station in Japan.

When Ted retired in Florida, he pursued many aspects of artistic activities including creating and teaching a calligraphy course at Central Florida Community College and The Appleton Museum of Art. He founded the Creative Calligraphers of Citrus Springs, a society dedicated to the furtherance of calligraphy. He coauthored a book on Japanese art and calligraphy, The Sumi-e Dream Book, and has participated in two-person art shows at The Appleton Museum of Art, Central Florida Community College, Pasco Community College and at the Pasco Fine Arts Commission in Holiday, Florida. His latest creation is a video, Calligraphy: An Overview. In this video he discusses the Paleographic Aspects of Calligraphy in various cultures throughout the ages.

Ted Mayhall’s calligraphic art is in collections of calligraphy enthusiasts here and abroad. He left his legacy of beautiful calligraphy to us to enrich our lives.