But beyond being an artist Zhao was also proof of something, a living example of a fact you thought must be true but couldn't prove. There had to be multiple ways of going about it — had to be. If the whole little tree business was truly an art form then there couldn't be just one right way. Art doesn't work like that.
Read MoreThe baldcypress water-and-land planting Mr. Zhao made for us in his 1998 demonstration program was remarkably good right from the time he put it together. It had a great feeling to it, a kind of authenticity that evoked the experience of being in nature, somewhere in the hushed coniferous forest where the sound of water splashing on rock is so persistent it ceases to be noticeable.
Read MoreIn America Mr. Zhao was best known in those days for one of his tray landscape plantings done in the water-and-land penjing style. The landscape depicted a scene wherein horses are resting in the shade of flowering trees, with picturesque boulders strewn about and a stream nearby. This penjing was titled: Painting With Eight Horses.
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