New Releases by Song Nan Zhang

Through the ages, the dragon has been an important symbol for the Chinese. A time of Golden Dragons is the most auspicious possible. In fascinating text and beautiful paintings, Song Nan and Hao Yu Zhang trace the dragon’s history. Perhaps inspired by giant crocodiles, the image of the dragon affects every aspect of life in China, including the marking of dragon years, the flying of dragon kites, and the eating of dragon cakes at dragon boat races. A splendid introduction to the richness of Chinese culture, this is a book to cherish this special year and for years to come.

The story of Imperial Admiral Zhong He, who during the early Ming dynasty explored the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

Before coming to Canada, while he was still an art teacher in Beijing, Song Nan Zhang traveled from Inner Mongolia east, south, and north to find and paint unusual scenes of Chinese family life. Here are the children who grow up in the saddle with their nomadic parents or become as agile as the mountain goats they tend. A boy plays chess on the ground with his shepherd grandfather. A teenager tends her father’s pottery shop. At festivals a child plays hide-and-seek, behind yellow parasols, and stilt dancers wait to compete.

In 1968, as part of Mao’s Cultural Revolution, thousands of teenagers were “relocated.” The artist’s brother was sent to a place that could not have been more different from his crowded, noisy Beijing home. He was sent to the steppes to live with Mongolian herdsmen. The studious, gentle, city boy had much to learn: he had to memorize the faces of his catt≤ he had to learn to ride with the greatest horsemen in the world; he had to adjust to food, clothing, and scenery wildly different from anything he had ever known. Despite the hard life, he grew to love Mongolia. His respect for the people who befriended him and his admiration for them were recorded in his diaries. Song Nan Zhang’s gorgeous paintings are the perfect complement to an unforgettable true story.

Just about every civilization has stories of creation. The myths and legends of the ancient Greeks and Romans are very well known, but these 12 myths from ancient China are just as fascinating. Between Pangu separating the sky from the earth and the Northern Emperor separating man from gods, we have an array of deities as busy and colorful as those in Greek and Roman myths. They create men out of clay, mend the broken sky after the flood, and shoot down suns so that life on earth will not die. Inspired by the art of the Ming Dynasty, this is a wonderful collection of Chinese myths of creation, illustrated by award-winning artist Song Nan Zhang.

In 1944, when Song Nan Zhang was not yet three, he saw a baby tiger outside the hut in the mountains where he and his mother were living. The tiger returned twice before disappearing into the bamboo forest forever. For a child to see a tiger meant luck, but Song Nan Zhang wasn''t sure if living in China was lucky or not. Life was so difficult that sometimes he felt like the lost tiger itself, hoping for a home only to be forced back into the dark. In this, his autobiography, Song Nan Zhang paints the dispersal of his family, his development as an artist, the humor that lightened some of the more difficult times, and finally, his journey to Canada.