Going to Cheerio

I have been quite distracted from the blogging world the last few weeks. It all started with hurricane Isaac. He was the slowest moving storm I have ever experienced. I didn't think he would ever get here, much less leave! But 15" of rain and 2 days without electricity later, we were cleaning up and moving on, trying to get caught up from the 'hurricane days'. . . . .Some people have 'snow days', we have 'hurricane days':)

This house is not suppose to be in the water!

I was able to complete a beautiful wedding envelope project in Dr. Martin's Spetralite Gold. Even though there is so much stirring involved, I enjoy writing with this ink.

Oh the bling of gold!

And now, I am getting ready for John Stevens' class and a week at Cheerio! YAY!!!!

I have order supplies and have been working on the practice work that Mr. Stevens has sent out. Prepping and priming for brush Roman Caps. How intimidating is that?!? I hardly ever work with a brush so I need lots of practice. I am so excited.

     

Practice, Practice, Practice!

I will be away for a couple of weeks, but will have a special post when I return. Something along the lines of a blogging milestone and a new address.

Rooted

This piece was created for the 

Louisiana Board of Adoption Services 

silent auction held last spring.

It was created on Arches cold press watercolor paper

 with acrylics, inks and pointed nib.

Calligraphy Triptych

These little gems were created using watercolor and Dr. Martin's bleedproof white ink

on Arches cold press watercolor paper.

The painted square is 3"x3" on 5"x8" paper size.  

The words are from 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 and are definitely words to live by.

Selah

Commission

Each verse written in watercolor on 140# Fabriano soft press watercolor paper.
The finish of this paper is between cold press and hot press

 and is a lovely paper to write and paint on.

Psalm 32:7

Psalm 62:8

Time for Study

As I am sure it is for everyone, this year is speeding by for me. There have been oh so many projects this year; spring seems to energize everyone! So many times, I thought, I need add this project to my blog. Then, of course, time slipped away and the task of sharing in the blog remained undone.

Now as things slow down and I catch my breath, I hope to share some of those projects. But first a brief look at a current study.

"WISDOM is the perfect RELATIONSHIP between BEGINNING and END."

This statement came from reflection of a A.W. Tozer quote, "Wisdom sees everything in focus, each in proper relation to all, and is thus able to work toward predestined goals with flawless precision."


These three pieces are a quick outpouring of the meditation on that particular thought.

(As I lay down thoughts and create different calligraphic studies, I will be adding them to my etsy shop. 

Maybe the concepts and ideas will resonate with someone else as well.)

Bound and Lettered

I have just received the current issue of Bound and Lettered. It is a great publication on 

books, papercraft, and calligraphy.

I have had my subscription for a few years and 

always look forward to getting it. The magazine can be purchased from John Neal Booksellers. 

I am honored to say I was able to participate in this issue. 

A small manuscript book I made for the yearlong Reggie Ezell class,

'Primitive to Modern', was featured.

If you do not receive this supscription, you should definitely look into it.

Bound and Lettered always has a wealth of information

and lots of eye candy. And if you would like to participate, they are always looking for how-to

articles on calligraphy, bookbinding, and paper crafts.

This issue also has an article by Fiona Dempster, 

arthur of the blog Paper Ponderings, about the project A Letter A Week. 

Check out these links if you enjoy letters and artist books.

Adolf Bernd Influence

I have been completely immersed in putting together a group of pieces for an upcoming exhibit. All other things have been neglected and put on hold. But until I can come up for air, here is a piece of a set in progress. 

Happy Creating!

dry embossing (con't)

The previous blog entry chronicled the first step in a new piece called 'I AM'.  I was unsure how to add the complete phrase. I debated between writing the full quote underneath the embossed letters, or writing the remaining quote in ink incorporating the embossed letters, or repeating the entire quote in the full field of the background. The latter option was chosen. Then for added effect, one of the repeated phrases was highlighted using palladium gilding. 

Watercolor and a Mitchell nib was used for the main portion of the text. Gum ammoniac was used for the gilding. (Note: using ammoniac on paper is tricky and requires many layers because it gets absorbed into the paper.)

dry embossing

 have always loved the look of embossed letters and thought I would give it a try on a new piece. This is the beginning. . . .

The passage will be 'Be still and know that I AM God". I am really excited with I AM but am not sure how to include the rest of the phrase. Maybe I will place the entire quote below and leave the I AM as the focal point of the piece. I am inspired by Jane Farr's piece as seen here. But maybe I can repeat the quote in a soft muted color all around the I AM.

This is the template of the letters used to emboss. I used the backing of a paper pad to cut out the letters. The letters were then pressed into Arches textwove paper. I tried several papers and the textwove gave the best results by far.

Thank you

Thank you all who have followed along

on my journey of experimenting and

working in calligraphy 

and the calligraphic arts.

I am truly blessed to 

be able to pursue my passion

and to share the things

 I learn and create

with a such a supportive

 group of individuals.

My gratitude goes out to you!

Commission

I had the wonderful opportunity to create this birth gift. It was a fun and refreshing commission. The name and date are written in pressurized Roman Caps with sumi ink and a watercolor shadow. The middle text is brush lettering in sumi ink with watercolor washes in between.

How do you know? Unless you try.

In the last post, I was debating whether I should try to cover up a mistake in the gilding by adding black to the piece of work. It had been suggested to me to make a high quality print of the piece and try the black on that first. I tried to do just that, but I found it very difficult to print out the gold to my liking. So, whereas, making a print is usually the best way to try something you are unsure of, in the case of gilding I found it did not work for me. Since this piece was started as a final 'draft', I decided to just go for it. Below is the result. It is definitely different from the previous version. And even though it is not bad, it is not the look I want for this piece. So my final will be as in the previous post, just gilding on vellum.

That's the great thing about art. Some things work, some don't, but you can always try again. Sometimes I get bogged down in the fear of messing up. Then I freeze and cannot create anything, instead of just trying.

Artistic decisions

I am in a dilema. The attached piece is completed as I had it in my mind. But there are a couple of mistakes with the gilding that I would really like to cover up. So I am debating adding a black border around the areas where the 'letters' are gilded. To tie that in so it doesn't look like I am just trying to hide something, I am thinking of filling in the 'letters' with black. There is a beautiful piece of work on Georgia Angelopoulos' website that has gilding with black and I love the look. (The work is at the bottom of the page.)

It has been suggested to me to make a copy of my piece on good matte paper and fill in to see if I like it. This I am going to do. But I wanted to get your opinion and see how you determine these things. What is your method for choosing the next step or deciding if the piece is complete?

Love Deeply

This image was written with sumi ink and a Speedball B-3 nib. The corners were squared off with sumi ink and a stiff pointed nib. I then scanned the image, vectorized it in Adobe Illustrator, then added an inner glow and drop shadow in Photoshop. 

"Intense love does not measure, it just gives." - Mother Teresa

Pic of the week

It has been too long! The summer has been a wonderful explosion of events and projects, but has taken me away from the blogging world. I hope to get back into my routine of staying in contact with my fellow bloggers.

I am very honored and excited to say one of my pieces have been selected as Reggie Ezell's 'Pic of the Week'. If you have not seen Reggie's website, you should definitely check it out here. Reggie chooses one piece of art each week that was generated from his year long class or the 'Primitive to Modern' class. There are many inspiring artists and calligraphy examples on his site.

Thanks for the encouragement Reggie!

Greeting cards on etsy shop

I have recently added three new items to my etsy shop. They are greeting cards printed with archival ink from my Epson 3880 (love my printer). The cards were created from original watercolors and calligraphy that were scanned into photoshop and manipulated.

I love to write words from the bible and hope others find them inspirational.

Meditations of the Heart

I seem to be having a bit of a mental block lately, struggling to find subject matter to put down. Or maybe, yes maybe, it is too much in my head that I cannot get anything to come out. Everything is wedged at the opening and nothing will budge.

Just today, finally, I wrote down this verse, added it to an existing background, and modified it in photoshop. Going to share it in with my study buddies next week.

Trying to find the groove

I just returned from a wonderful extended weekend trip and am trying to get back in the groove. I love to get away but sometimes feel a little disoriented on the return.

The quote below is some of the past homework from Reggie's class.

Still with the Small Canvases

Well, this is a continuation on a continuation. There were two earlier post showing the progression of a series of small canvases. One was a trio of sunflowers the other has turned into this square of nine canvases. The text, which is mostly washed away, is the personification of Wisdom as described in Proverbs. I love this text.

The things I like about this set is the colors and depth of color. The thing that I find is missing is a structural element. There is plenty of organic movement in each canvas and across the whole, but there is no linking structural element. What do you think?

the final series

closeup before the text was washed away

the nine before all the text has been washed away in places

Roman Cap study

I am still practicing with the Roman caps from my earlier posts. These are written in gouache on Fabriano paper (the combination is nice) using a Speedball #1.