宣
Symbols Emotions
catharsis
洩
ㄒㄩㄢ ㄒㄧㄝˋ xuān xiè
Two versions of the same picture, and both are free with no account and no watermark. The first has no background at all, which is the one to send your artist — but a phone or computer photo viewer set to dark will show black strokes on dark grey and it can look like nothing downloaded. If that happens, use the second one: identical characters on a plain white background. Either way you get the characters on their own — the square and the faint guide lines you see above are not in the file. Each character is 1000px, so a two-character download is 2000×1000, and the script and layout are the ones you picked.
Script
Characters
Same in both
Layout
Rubbing mode: white on black, as a stone rubbing. The download is unaffected.
Chinese has no single word for this; the nearest options mean letting the feeling out, or being cleansed by it.
Before you commit
Choose with care宣洩 is plainly about venting pressure and lacks the purification English catharsis implies. Nothing in Chinese carries both halves at once.
At small sizes宣 is 9 strokes and open, 洩 is 14 with a water radical. The pair reduces reasonably well for its density.
Cultural noteThe standard equivalents are 宣洩, letting the feeling out, and 淨化, being cleansed by it — both are used for Aristotle's term in Chinese writing on tragedy. 抒情 sits nearby but means lyrical expression, not release under pressure.
Meaning
To vent; to let feeling out.
The pressure-release half of catharsis, and the usual translation.
Other characters for “catharsis”
What to do next
Pick the script and layout you want above, download the PNG, and send that file to your artist. Ask them to work from the file rather than redrawing the character freehand — that is where strokes go missing.
Related concepts