Smoke Gets in Your Eyes



Just when I think I've seen it all...along comes a client who wants to present cutting boards and cheese stones to winners of a local tennis tournament! Four. Of each.

After practicing on scrap wood, I did the lettering on paper, then transferred it in chalk before taking the woodburning tool to it.


The first pass was a little funky. Although I had sanded and steel-wooled the area lightly, there was still some kind of wax or oil on the surface.


 After sanding and steel-wooling again, a second pass gave a little more definition.


The cheese stones were a little easier--and more forgiving. Slate is so soft I could just scratch off any errant blobs of paint and after wiping with a damp paper towel, it didn't show at all. Since the surface was rather uneven, I stuck with monoline and used a new-to-me Montana Acrylic marker (refillable!) with an extra-fine tip.





Certainly not perfect, but way more useful than trophies!

Calligraphy Northwest: Dynamic Duo

Julian Waters & Carl Rohrs, June 2012
Last post I mentioned that Reed College's Eliot Hall was where Fr. Edward Catich cut the lintel stones, and Lloyd Reynolds taught his calligraphy classes back in the day.
Eliot Hall, Reed College, Portland OR
So there, in the very same lecture hall---well, half of it, the other half is now the college president's office--two present-day calligraphic luminaries held forth with a course titled "20th Century Inspirations and 21st Century Techniques" during the week of Calligraphy Northwest in June.  Julian Waters and Carl Rohrs started out by giving us what clearly had been a labor of love for each of them:  a total of 248 pages, bound in two volumes, of their own work alongside that of their "inspirateurs", some familiar, some obscure (at least to me). There is enough material here for a lifetime of study!  If my house ever catches fire, I know what I'll be grabbing on the way out the door!
Workbooks by Carl Rohrs (top) &  Julian Waters (bottom) for CNW
Most of the time I was so busy listening, observing, absorbing and experimenting that I took very few photos.  To be honest, a lot of it is just now sinking in.
Julian demos while Carl comments
Contrast!

It's all in the details!

This wasn't a product-oriented class, but a rather stream-of-consciousness romp through big ideas and tiny details--which seem now either too vast or too small to write about here.  In what they had predicted would be a "somewhat improvisatory" presentation, it was fascinating to listen to Carl & Julian's banter, filled with seriously encyclopedic knowledge of fonts and all things calligraphic. For example, did you know that Rudolf Koch had designed minuscules for his1920s Neuland typeface, but they were abandoned?  Here's my attempt at approximation:


We worked with broad nib, automatic pen, folded nib, ruling pen, flat brush and pointed brush. Here we were trying to eliminate as much negative space as possible in our blackletter:


That afternoon we switched to pointed brush and my head almost exploded!  I won't trouble you with illustrations of my feeble attempts.

At the end of the week there was a "show and share" in the dining hall.  What a feast!







I apologize for the lack of attribution--way too many to keep track of.

It was announced that in addition to the 2013 conference at Colorado College next summer, the 2015 conference will take place in the Bay Area!  Save the dates!

Top Brass

Finished size approx. 12" X 16"
The GRAMMY-nominated Bay Brass (has a nice ring to it, does it not?) had organized a concert to honor the recently-retired repairman who has kept their horns--and those of most brass players in the area--in working condition for many years, and to benefit a music camp scholarship fund in his name.  Last-minute scroll request + free design reign + school vacation week = BLISS!  On break from my day job (only job, actually...), I barely left the studio for ten days;  my sweet husband kept me supplied with liquid and solid refreshment while I put to use some of the techniques I have learned in classes these last several years!

As I've said before, Pergamanata paper is a dream for corrections and that's my kinda paper!  I did have a little trouble with the brushed Finetec metallics buckling and flaking off the page, but after a brief consultation with the inimitable Heather Held (thanks, Heather!) I played around with the thickness and that seemed to do the trick.  Next time I would probably pre-treat with gum sandarac, another of her great suggestions.

My initial sketch (full-size):



As usual--and especially since this was a hurry-up job--I planned for it to fit in a standard-sized frame (in this case 16" X 20") from our local craft store.  With my trusty compact mat cutter I double matted it in blue and gold, 2" and 2-1/2" respectively.



Tools and supplies:  Moon Palace sumi; 23k gold leaf; Instacoll; gouache; Finetec gold and silver; Derwent graphite 3B; Zebra G pointed nib; Brause 1mm, 1.5mm and 3 mm;  Micron pigma 005; Uniball signo .18; Copic multiliner .03; Neopiko Line 2 005;  Pergamanata heavyweight paper.  And last but certainly not least:  X-acto knife with #4 stencil blade and Faber-Castell Perfection 7058B eraser!

My Brush with Greatness


What is it about white on black that makes lettering look better than it is?  Kind of like candlelight that way.


Earlier this year I was asked to make some signs for a local chamber ensemble, the Bay Brass.  They were performing at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music to celebrate the release of their CD "Sound the Bells", a labor of love eight years in the making. 


Little did I know at the time that the CD would go on to be nominated for a Grammy! Since my husband plays in the group, my first thought was--do we get to go to the awards?!?  But I think the classical small ensemble awards are probably handed out the night before, maybe in the basement, or the parking lot...drive-by...oh well.  Lady Gaga will have to wait to meet me.

Anyway, you can hear samples of, and/or purchase, this amazing recording here, along with their Christmas album which is awesome and has been a favorite for over ten years.  Be sure to mention you know their calligrapher...

Border Trouble

I recently learned the expression "border trouble", in this case referring not to immigration---nor to illuminated borders, like the one above---but rather to the sometimes-daunting obstacle between the idea for a piece and the point at which it begins to take shape.  Since I sometimes struggle mightily to move through that region, it helps me to think of it as just a transition, kind of a bothersome ordeal one has to go through to move into the pleasure on working on the piece once it starts to come to life, not to mention once it is finished.

It's school fundraiser season once again and I created this piece to raise some money for a good cause.  Artwork doesn't always do well in a silent auction but this was displayed nicely and went for a pretty penny!  The border outline came from the fabulous collection of the Graphics Fairy (you really need to go to that site, and bookmark it!);  I was able to take a little shortcut and print it onto tracing paper (rather than actually tracing it) and then transferred it to Arches 140 lb hot press with Armenian bole.

Because of the nature of the quote, I used more colors than I usually would have in the border.  The ink is Pelikan (with some powdered gum arabic added);  the rest of the design is gouache, pen, and 23K gold leaf.  I used a [left-handed] Brause 1.5mm nib;  the image is about 7.5" X 10.5".  I used my Logan Compact Mat Cutter (which has come in handy more times than I can count) to cut the mat, then popped it into a frame I picked up at Michael's half-price.  Ta-dah!

Silk Purse from Sow's Ear


So after four-plus years of Blackletter classes at Atelier Gargoyle, I had acquired an impressive pile of butcher paper practice sheets that it seemed wrong to throw away.  One of my classmates had suggested I use them for wrapping paper, which was fun and different--very cute when tied with string.  For some reason I thought to grab a few sheets as I went out the door to an evening collage class with the inimitable Anna Corba, incongruously but delightfully being held at Knitterly, a favorite local yarn store.  We were provided with kits and lots of boxes of ephemera to dig through, and I thought my walnut-inked specimens were a nice contrast to the image elements.  (Don't look too closely at the letterforms, Linnea & Ward--the sheets are really old, okay?  That's my story anyway.)


We made collages on two pieces of matboard, then coated them with melted beeswax, which gave them surprising depth and dimension.  The covers were assembled with the notebook elements and bound together with ribbon.





 A fun project and a nice mid-week escape!

Bye Bye Blackletter

The names of everyone who has ever attended a Black Sabbath class
by Ward Dunham
It was a bittersweet event.  On Saturday, December 4, students and friends of Ward Dunham & Linnea Lundquist gathered to celebrate the end of four-and-a-half years of "Black Sabbath" blackletter classes in their San Francisco studio, Atelier Gargoyle.  Those of us lucky enough to attend these monthly Saturday sessions were expertly and enthusiastically schooled in Textura, Johnstonian Italic, Uncial, Batarde, and other related topics by two exceptional calligraphers who happen to be a couple and, often, a comedy duo.



There was food, including cupcakes from the wonderful Jasmine Rae Bakery, who have kept us in yummy gingerbread and other delectables these last few years.


Look closely...those are fondant Brause pen nibs!  Good enough to eat, and we did.


Ward tended bar, offering his signature Hot Apple Pie adult beverage...


...while Linnea helped everyone stock up on supplies from the shop.


The exhibit of the students' final projects, beautifully displayed on the studio walls and tables, was varied and awe-inspiring!




Here is a closer look at a few of the pieces for which the photos came out reasonably well.  There were so many wonderful ones!

Meredith Jane Klein
Paul Costanzo



David Brookes

Patricia Coltrin

Jessie Evans
Helen Fung 
Bonnie Noehr
Dean Robino
Raoul Martinez
There were awards, speeches, and heartfelt tributes, followed by lively conversation and merrymaking!








Ward made sure we all had the contact information for their new abode in Half Moon Bay...


...and Linnea, along with the rest of us, shed a few tears.


But it has been a great run, and all of us who participated are richer for it.  Black Sabbath has been an important part of the San Francisco calligraphy community, and will be sorely missed.  Thank you, Ward & Linnea!  It has been a pleasure and a privilege.

Grace Under Pressure

"Grace", original size approximately  8" X 18"
What is it about a looming deadline that brings clarity to our thinking?  This is a piece I had been mulling over for at least a year, occasionally pulling out the quotation and fooling around with it.  Then Linnea Lundquist & Ward Dunham announced they would be closing their wonderful studio, Atelier Gargoyle, on December 4th with an all-day party and show of their students' work.  This was the incentive I needed, and I knew it had to get done and delivered this week since I would be out of town most of the two weeks before the celebration.


It truly has been a gift to have access to Ward & Linnea's wisdom and expertise these last four-and-a-half years at their monthly Saturday "Black Sabbath" classes in San Francisco where we explored Textura, Batarde, Uncial, Johnstonian Italic (aka Pointed Gothic)--in short, all things Blackletter.  Very early on, after Ward made some jokingly snide remarks about Pointed Pen People, I sent them a New Years card I had designed in Spencerian, knowing that I was "outing" myself as a PPP.  They both responded with one of their famous postcards, enthusiastically encouraging me to work with the two styles "for ultimate contrast", and encouraging me to "look to your Bickham".  "Be the one," wrote Linnea, "to combine the two with panache."  I've never forgotten that, and have always been grateful.


At every Black Sabbath class we painstakingly ground our black Chinese stick ink, and occasionally used Chinese vermillion for electric red accents.  With this piece I wanted to stay faithful to that.  I had originally planned to illuminate the "G" but in looking at my roughs, Linnea encouraged me to keep it simpler.  The diamonds on the G and B are gilded.

When Sheila Waters was in town earlier in the year, she had shown us her latest work on Pergamanata paper, singing its praises and vellum-like qualities, in particular the easy correctability.  I decided then and there it must be the paper for me, and although it took some getting used to, I am now a devoted fan.  It is not at all as mottled looking as in the scan above, and it seemed able to take endless scraping and erasures without complaint.


As I said, there was a deadline involved and with understanding friends and a supportive spouse, I holed up in the studio for days, finally coming through with a piece I could live with, then cutting mats for it and popping it into a frame for the show.  I'm looking forward to seeing my classmates' work and getting together one last time;  we've all come a long way in 4+ years and there is some amazing and varied talent in the group.  It's been a great run and I'm very sad it's over.

Buncha Uncial



There's a local institution that asks me each year to inscribe their graduates' names on their diplomas.  The first year, I was given a sample of their previous calligrapher's work, which was a very bold Uncial hand.  I thought it was a bit odd for a diploma, but have come to appreciate how it goes with the rest of the document (which I'm not showing here, but take my word for it...).  Now I have lots of fun playing with letter variations, "to-dot-or-not-to-dot" (a point on which Ward Dunham and Sheila Waters will forever disagree), and how to squeeze some of those very long names onto the page with this expansive hand.


One solution is to overlap letters---love the double-double-Ns.



Letters of Note(s)



I was browsing through gothic exemplars one day and found a picture of a woodcarving where the letters looked as if they were made from ribbons.  I started wondering if that were possible.  Some antique sheet music pretty much jumped into my hand and let me cut it into strips, and then the fun began, twisting and folding and gluing.  I made the curls by winding the paper around a pencil for a few minutes, then tacking it in place. 











For me this piece was symbolic because right around that time I had decided to give up a longtime musical career, which had floundered for lack of enthusiasm, and pursue calligraphy as my artistic outlet.  I've never looked back!   (Thanks, Carole, for the photos!)


Eleven for the Class of '10

Last weekend I met with the parents of Marin Waldorf's Class of 2010, while the students were on their eighth grade trip, to help them paint their children's diplomas. This one is all new elements (sometimes I re-use pieces from year to year, see the older ones here) and I'm kind of tickled with my first curved masthead and the little ribbon banner at the top. The lettering is Spencerian and blackletter.

It was an enthusiastic, talented and focused group! We had ten of eleven families represented, so one parent worked on two diplomas.


It was really fun to hear the conversation as snippets of news about their children were shared.


Notice the poster in the background above: a gloriously engrossed and illuminated poster of the Gettysburg Address! A little unexpected inspiration.




I wanted a picture of each painter, but my camera battery didn't cooperate. Everyone did a great job and I think they look beautiful!

Walnut-Covered Chocolate

This was a homework piece for Ward Dunham & Linnea Lundquist's monthly "Black Sabbath" class at their wonderful studio, Atelier Gargoyle. The assignment was to write one word all in Gothic caps--something you'd probably never want to do in the real world. It was an exercise in spacing, and legibility be damned! Considering my choice of word, walnut ink was the obvious medium.

Graduation, Illuminated: Diploma Tutorial

One of my first projects after taking an awesome illumination class with Bill Kemp at Castle in the Air in Berkeley back in 2004 was to design a diploma for my son's eighth grade graduating class at Marin Waldorf School. Since there were only nine graduates that year, I was able to hand paint each of diploma after printing the basic wording and design on my inkjet and inscribing each student's name. The illumination design here is Bill's from the class; I just changed a "W" to an "M".

Word got around, and the next year's class requested a diploma, but I didn't have time to paint them all myself--so I decided to enlist the help of the parents by giving a mini-class in illumination around my kitchen counter.

The end result:


Now it has become an (almost) annual tradition for the parents to gather--often while the class is on its eighth-grade trip--and sometimes they "do it up" with a potluck dinner as well. Groups have ranged from four to about twenty. Each parent paints his/her own child's diploma; if a parent can't attend, usually someone in the group will take on an extra one. It's a bittersweet time for these families who have devoted so much of themselves to the school, and who are preparing for their not-so-little ones to begin the high school adventure.

Although I do reuse some elements (usually cutting and pasting digitally), I try to make each year's diploma unique. For Marin Waldorf School, I'm always on the lookout for versions of the letter "M" that will work in this context.

Here is what we start with, printed on diploma parchment or any kind of nice heavy-ish paper that is smooth enough for me to calligraph the name, and sturdy enough to hold up to the gouache with which we will paint it:

Before meeting with the parents, I inscribe each student's name and cover it thoroughly with post-its to protect it during the painting process.

I prepare a bookmark-sized color key, and copy one for each painter/parent. I like to use pencil because it shows the shadings better, and doesn't "give away" the full effect of the deep-toned gouaches.

Provided for each participant:
  • palette
  • size 00 or 0 brush
  • black gel pen
  • water cup
  • cardboard cushion
Shared among the group:
  • gouache in red, blue, green, and purple
  • Windsor-Newton gold ink
  • several burnishing tools (bone folders or backs of spoons will work too)
  • several embossing tools
We start by painting the gold background for the illuminated letter. Each coat, as it dries, is burnished. It usually takes about three coats, burnished after each one, until the gold looks opaque. The gold is then "tooled", or debossed, in traditional designs. Next we paint the colors in gouache, following the key card (or not--always a rogue in the group!). Shading is added in slightly deeper tones, and finally everything is outlined carefully in black with a fine point gel pen to set if off and define the design.

This was a large group, so we used a school classroom. Great concentration!


And the final product:

Here is the most recent edition (sorry for the camera phone photo):


The finishing touch is a diploma cover, which can be purchased for under $5 each. For a few more cents you can even add a tassel! The diplomas are then taken to the appropriate "authorities" to be signed and made official.

It is important to stress that this is about a four-hour process, and because of the specialized tools, materials and instruction involved, is not a take-home project. It's not always easy for busy parents to set aside this much time! But well worth it.

Mixing It Up Again


Here's another piece I did for the frontispiece of a family memory book. It is photographed rather than scanned, so the shape looks odd. Again, the contrast of two very different hands, one with pointed and one with a broad nib: this time Spencerian and Blackletter/Pointed Gothic/Johnstonian Italic. The little gold feathery flourishes are done with the pointed pen and Spectralite, a line of paint made for airbrushing. The white is Dr. Ph. Martin's Bleedproof Ink.

Bickham on Bamboo?


Look what I found yesterday in Columbine, a little local gift shop! It's a bamboo floor mat about 2' x 3' in size, made for indoor use. There's another design you can see here. Presumably the artwork is taken from the cover of a handwriting text (unfortunately the binding partially obscures the last word, "youth"), could be Bickham Sr. or Jr., (or any number of other penmen) and features pointed pen, Roman, and blackletter styles blended artfully and flourished beautifully. Perfect for my studio!

This Year's Runner-Up


Though I seem to be in a New Year's card groove, I've always loved this snippet of lyrics from "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen"--such a simple and universal wish. So when the November assignment at Ward Dunham & Linnea Lundquist's monthly Black Sabbath blackletter class at Atelier Gargoyle in San Francisco was to make a design with two or three seasonal words, I went back to this tried-and-true sentiment. To tie it all together, for the little words I took out my pointed pen and went for the ultimate contrast (blackletter--though in this case, whiteletter--and Spencerian), as Ward has encouraged me to do. ("Look to your Bickham," he says.) Guess I'll file this one away for a year when no inspiration strikes, or I break my shoulder again...