By the early 1960s, Zao often titled paintings with the date on which they were completed. The neutral title blocks narrative instructions and asks the viewer to enter through the painting's internal weather. Here ochre, black, and chalky white compress into a turbulent vertical field.
The composition has no fixed foreground or background. Marks can read as fracture, spray, calligraphy, or geological pressure. That instability is central to Zao's mature language: the painting stays rooted in nature without turning into a picture of nature.
