DOMESTIKA COURSE – ENGLISH CALLIGRAPHY – ALTERNATIVE LETTERS, NUMBERS AND COMPOSITION
A couple of not terribly successful sessions – a mixed bag, really.
Alternative letters
This was quite a short lesson, and not very exciting. It was really about different entry and exit strokes on various lowercase letters for variety, and also for helping join with other letters.
Numbers
Most of the numbers were no problem, but the teacher’s version of “5” was very difficult! I think it was over-complicated compared with the other numbers, and it didn’t seem to match very well with them. I will seek an alternative for my own work. I also really struggled with the zero – as I had done with the letter “O” as it was pretty much the same. I don’t know what it is about this double oval curve but it has me stumped! I keep starting it in the wrong place and it all goes wrong.
Punctuation marks
These were no problem. The teacher also wrote upside-down exclamation and question marks because these are used in Spanish! I didn’t bother with those. The ampisand was quite difficult and the two variations she shared do need more practice. She said she collects ampisands and has a lot of different ones written in her sketch book. It is a good idea to seek out variations of everything so that you can develop your own style, and add different forms to suit the context.
As you can see on the above photo, half-way through, I abandoned my grid, and the lines went all over the place. Also, my nib didn’t seem to be working that well. Not a very edifying result to part one of the 26th April’s session – what I did in the wee small hours when most sensible people are in bed!
Composition
This was an exercise in writing on different shapes, rather than following a simple linear form.
Writing on a curve
The teacher’s phrase was “Here comes the sun, the little darling” which perhaps was referring to her child? My first effort was the large one, which didn’t allow space to complete the sentence.
I continued to add my own phrases on pencil-drawn lines in order to fill the page. Not too bad an effort, and I was quite pleased with this result.
Writing on a circle
For this exercise, we simply repeated the alphabet around the circle. I added some flourishes but was not able to match the teacher’s beautiful ones – part of the problem was that she moved so fast and it was really difficult stopping the iPad exactly where I wanted. I think I shall take some screen grabs so I can work on them at my leisure.
Later today…
I had another session this afternoon. For the first part of the session I worked on a piece of card, attempting to gild it with some mock-silver leaf and some used gold foil. The result was a bit of a mess but I think I can make something of it. More on this in a moment.
Nibs
I also tried one of my new nibs. This was a complete failure. I bought two of these (Speedball) and they do not have reservoirs which is a pain – constant dipping which interrupts the flow of work. Also, I had a terrible job getting the nib into the holder, and when I decided the nib was not going to work for me and I pulled it out, the holder was then too loose for my original nib. I managed to squash it back a bit and the nib didn’t fall out. I think I need to order some more nibs with reservoirs. As a beginner, it’s really difficult to know which would be best. I’ve looked at what other people use and of course everyone’s personal preference is different. I may end up buying a lot of duds but eventually I shall find something that suits me. I have no idea what my two existing successful nibs are because they came in a job lot from Amazon, unbranded. I also intend buying another couple of angled nib holders.
More practice
I had intended practising the new lower case alphabet that I found on Pinterest a couple of days ago, but decided instead to work on some different forms of capitals. I found a good image on Pinterest and worked on some of those letters.
This proved very difficult. It is so hard getting the proportions of the flourishes correct. One has to remember constantly that this style of writing is based on ovals, but they feature circles too… I ringed the ones that seemed to be closest to the original, so I know to practise these. The first sheet was a disaster and I have scratched it out, but this second sheet was a little better.
Inspiration
Each module of the course has “additional resources” to help us. In this module, the teacher recommended a couple of professional calligraphers who inspire her. One of them left me cold and I didn’t bother with that, but the other one completely blew me away and I simply adore his work! His name is Denis Brown, and he is from Dublin in Ireland. His website is QuillSkill where you can see his work.
He does some absolutely extraordinary work on layered sheets of glass. The engraved calligraphy merges together as you see through the various layers, and there is a magical 3-D effect as you move it. It is impossible to explain the beauty of these pieces, or the effect they had on me – you have to visit and see for yourself. He has several videos which show them to their best effect. As with all 3-D work, photos cannot do them justice.
He also does more conventional calligraphy but this is also very unusual. He often gilds his substrate before working, and adds splashes of paint, additional gilding flakes and background drawings done in the calligraphic style. He uses a broad nib and it is fascinating watching him work, with bold strokes which often result in spatters and splashes of ink. I am totally entranced by the work of this artist. He is also on YouTube and social media where you can see his work. I highly recommend him.
Final piece
It looks as if our final piece on this course will be an invitation to an imaginary event. I thought I would attempt a gilded background, which is why I attempted to make this during this afternoon’s session.
Future plans
I read a novel once where the wife of the main character was an artist who made multi-layered transparent anatomical drawings. The idea absolutely fascinated me at the time, and Denis Brown’s 3-D glass work reminded me of it. I would love to have a go at something like this, maybe working with acetate. 3-D work has always fascinated me – I have a couple of Domestika courses lined up, on pop-ups which are a passion of mine.
Previous 3-D transparent work
When we celebrated our silver wedding in 2011, I made my hubby a framed shadow box with layers of acetate inside a reflective box. I made a series of videos about the making of this project, and if you search my YouTube channel for “Silver Wedding Shadow Box” you can see it – I recommend part 5 for the final assembly, showing the 3-dimensional nature of the piece to its best advantage. There is a series of our wedding photos at the end as well. You can read full details of this project in the “Archival Revival” tab on this blog, under the year 2011.
