A CELTIC ART SAMPLER
Celtic art
Recently I started work on some pop-up projects which included a rotating circles pop-out. I decided to decorate it with some Celtic art and knew I needed to practise. As a result of this, the pop-ups have taken a back seat for a while, as I work on perfecting my Celtic art skills. I have found a good selection of YouTube videos with instructions and inspiration, and I also own a couple of books on the subject.
Celtic Art is an intriguing art form with its beautiful woven knot work, spirals, and fantastical zoomorphics. The skill of these unnamed ancient artists is incredible as one examines such artefacts as the Book of Kells, the Lindisfarne Gospels, jewellery, and numerous stone carvings. It is a real blessing that these objects have survived to our time, and that this style of art has enjoyed a revival in recent times. The style covers different regional origins and time periods and the lines between these are somewhat blurred as the different cultures borrowed from one another.
Artists today have developed different methods of drawing the complex interwoven knot patterns and have generously shared their methods on YouTube.
My Celtic art sampler
I drew this in my small black Rhodia drawing book where I do all my black ink work with touches of gold. I recently bought a single Kuretake pan of gold watercolour as I was keen to try this medium. The result was interesting – it is a much more subtle, almost rose-gold colour, than my fine Posca acrylic marker pen, and different also from the gold Perfect Pearls that I have also used in this book. For this drawing, I am pleased with the result with the Kuretake paint because it lends a vintage look in keeping with the style.
I drew the sampler right across a double-page spread. I intentionally left the construction marks at the beginning, partly as a reference for myself, and partly because it is interesting to see how the knot work is constructed.
As you can see, I developed the complexity of the design as I worked from left to right.
The sampler includes examples of knot work borders, and the famous triquetra design which was used to represent the Trinity. I also added a couple of small spirals, and some Celtic-style text.
Practice samples
I made some rough sketches and did some experiments in my Coptic-bound sketchbook where I do my experimental stuff. It’s certainly not full of works of art and some of the pages are quite messy!
Experiments with free-form Celtic knot work. I’ve done some of this before. It’s tremendous fun. YOu can draw whatever shapes you want, using sinuous lines that overlap one another. When thickened, these can be made to weave over and under each other with the use of pencil and eraser.
Zoomorphics appear frequently in Celtic art. These stylised animal forms are sometimes recognised as real species, but often depict mythical beasts. Here are some initial drawings and experiments. The page on the left is unrelated to our current subject but just happened to come up while I was watching a YouTube video and decided to draw along, with examples of different kinds of fabric folds.
I copied a few designs from one of my Celtic art books from the “Templates” section at the back.
The mapping out of the knot work on the right was an act of desperation – I simply couldn’t work out how this particular pattern was drawn! The sketch is pretty rough – normally I would draw the grid with a ruler but this was done freehand, and quite large, in order to work out the interweavings of the ribbons. The aim was to produce the small zoomorphic at the top of the page. Scaling these drawings down was difficult, and impossible to make the interweaving ribbons of any thickness, so I just used thickened pen lines, with gaps where the over-and-under weavings occurred.
To return to the Celtic art sampler…
Here are some more detailed shots. Firstly, the left and right pages in their entirety.
The shading is a combination of ink work and graphite. The paper in this book is very smooth and doesn’t lend itself very well to blending graphite with a tortillion. Close-up, you can see too many unblended pencil lines, unfortunately, and also the inaccuracy of my fine line drawing, especially with the “aura” lines. I did me best! The picture is obviously better not zoomed right in but I thought it would be interesting to show the detail.
Details from the left-hand page:
This one shows the construction grids and lines for the knot work examples.
Details from the right-hand page:
I thought it was fun to leave in the construction dots on the bottom border, as a decorative element.
Not a perfect circle – it would have been better to use a compass!
Now for some closer detail.
I wanted an element of free-form Celtic knot work in this piece, so I drew this braid unravelling, and then being “ravelled” again as it joins the circle. You can also see some examples of spirals and zoomorphics.
Triquetra designs.
Finally, a photo of the page raised up to show the sheen of the gold watercolour paint, which doesn’t show up very well on the previous photos, where it appears brown. The gold is not overpowering, but imparts a subtle glow to the work.
