Lao Shu in Lotus Land

The Other China

幸有一片涼

Lao Shu 老樹 is the nom de plume of Liu Shuyong (劉樹勇, 1962-), a Beijing-based artist, writer, critic and professor in communications. His artistic voice is unique and personal, its tenor, whimsy and profundity evoke what for decades we have called The Other China — a cultural noosphere that is as undeniably local as it is universal.

For more work by Lao Shu in China Heritage, see The Other China and Intersecting with Eternity. For his latest art work (and merch), see Lao Shu Paintings 老樹畫畫 online at NetEase 網易.

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I met the landscape photographer Lois Conner in New York in the summer of 1996 (see The Affinities of Art), three decades ago, and over the years we have collaborated on many projects. One ongoing collaboration featured Lois’s obsession with the lotus in all of its permutations, and I followed her passionate pursuit of the plant, the blossom and the decaying beauty of the plant through Beijing parks and imperial gardens, at the Imperial Hunting Lodge in Chengde and, of course, at West Lake in Hangzhou, where I used a lotus leaf at the height of summer and we ate dishes made with lotus roots and the famous local sweet soup made from the ground root of the plant.

In the introductory essay that Lois invited me to contribute to her collection of photographs Twirling the Lotus: Photographs from Tibet and China (Anna Maria Rossi and Fabio Rossi Publications, London, 2007), I wrote that:

The lotus as a plant, an artistic design, an idea, even as a metaphor runs like a motif through much of Lois Conner’s work. She observes the exuberance of the lotus in early summer when all flourishes in rude confidence, then the change that follows on from plenitude leading to autumnal decay. It is a cycle of birth, maturity and senescence that is repeated in every life: personal, social and national. It is an endlessly new story, one to which Lois adds a multifaceted visual meditation.

Still pursuing the lotus during all seasons in China, Lois also cultivates plants in the ponds at her home in rural Pennsylvania, which I, long becalmed in New Zealand, enjoy vicariously.

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In the northern summer of 2026, we offer a seasonal consideration on the lotus by the artist Lao Shu. See also:

Lao Shu Goes on a Work Trip, 26 June 2026
Lao Shu on the Consolation of Cats, 28 June 2026

— Geremie R. Barmé
Editor, China Heritage
30 June 2026

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A Fortunate Measure of Calm
幸有一片涼

Poems and paintings by Lao Shu
selected and translated by Geremie R. Barmé

In this life — perhaps no more than a fleeting dream —
at least there’s a crescent moon reflected in a lotus pond.
Amidst this overwrought and overheated world of ours
fortunately there is always a patch of reassuring calm.

— Lao Shu, Renyin Year of the Tiger [2022]

Turning things over in my mind — half a lifetime — it’s all just been a dream. After chasing various earnest plans, I’ve woken to the fact that they are as insubstantial as the mist. Regret, like a whisper, still steals upon me in the quiet of the night. The broken moon hangs high as nocturnal winds caress the edge of the pond, crystalline light moving on the shallow water around the lotuses.

The world is always steaming hot. Waves of people swell throughout the day, mundane affairs cling to them all. People, caught by tendrils of anxiety and restlessness, draw labored breaths.

But then there is this lotus pond and the moon’s reflection. The perfumed air offers cooling caresses to your face, dispelling the overwrought heat of the day, calming a restless mind. It a feverish era such as ours this little patch offers crisp and calm relief.

回首半生輾轉，此生竟渾如一夢。多少執念奔波，醒轉時都化作輕煙，只剩幾分悵然，在靜夜裡悄悄漫上來。夜風吹過塘岸，一彎殘月斜掛天邊，清輝淺淺地映在荷塘里。

這世界總裹著騰騰的熱。白日里人潮奔湧，俗事纏身，焦灼與浮躁像熱浪一樣裹著人，連呼吸都帶著幾分沈悶。

幸而還有這一方荷塘月色。水氣裹著荷香漫過來，清清涼涼地撲在臉上，散了周身暑氣，也平了心頭燥意。在這滾燙人間，能得這一片清寧涼意，便已是足夠珍貴的安穩。

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A pond filled with budding lotuses,
the flowers quickly glow with red.
Soon to be battered by wind and rain.
let them blossom here, in my painting.

– Lao Shu, early spring, Jiawu Year of the Horse [2014]

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The downpour pelts the lotus pond
the winds passing through the pavilion
where I sit enjoying the head-high flowers.
The world all too often lacks any charm
flowers remain rich in sentiment.

This body, this life, this world,
they pass, one thinks, one goes on,
for all the winning and all the loss.
What matters is to find of joy, rather
than the pursuit of fleeting fame.

— Lao Shu, painted lakeside at the height of summer,
Jihai Year of the Pig [2019]

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平生惟有一願，
天下盡成荷塘。
人世百般糾結，
此處一片清涼。

I’ve only really ever had one wish: that
the whole world could be a lotus pond.
Regardless of all of the strife elsewhere,
here would be a place of calming cool.

— Lao Shu 老樹

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看竹大風裡，
聽荷小雨中。
人活幾十年，
何必太匆匆？

Bamboo is best appreciated in wild winds,
as the lotus is best heard in gentle rain.
You only live for a few decades, so why
fritter it away rushing here and yon?

— Lao Shu 老樹

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你就是朵花兒，
萬綠一點嫣紅。
像個夢，隨著風，
慢慢划向俺心中。