Introduction
This work uses the everyday edible item "gourd" as its subject, yet deliberately removes concrete realism. Instead, it presents a state that is almost a still-life meditation through simplified forms and restrained brushwork. In the composition, the yellow gourd hangs above the blank space as rounded color blocks, with sparse and open lines that make the form seem to float within time. Zhao Erdai does not describe the appearance of the object, but rather captures its "presence"—mature and drooping, quiet yet not decaying. This gaze at ordinary objects is, in fact, the late artist's insight into the rhythm of life: unpretentious, unresistant, simply arising at the right moment, naturally.