I was tired of staring into space, my hands were restless and needed something to do. They were also far too clean – where were the ink stains and tacky bits of glue? And so, I picked up my nibs and tried to write again….
And lo, I managed to write 50 words without referring to my toothache, or embedding a weird video about asbestos…. things were definitely moving in the right direction, until……
This calligraphy site is still under construction, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t start adding my latest projects to my new blog!
For Halloween I signed up for an exchange with some UK calligraphy friends from Instagram. I wanted to attempt a new style of modern calligraphy… the scribbly unreadable variety where the lettering goes a bit wild and overlaps. This was tricky for me as I’m usually a stickler for making my writing legible – I will sometimes trash an envelope if there is an unsightly letter clash so making deliberate clashes made me wince. I used white Ecoline ink as it is less opaque than my preferred Dr Martin’s Bleed Proof White, and it achieved a ghostly effect I was after. My nib of choice was a Brause 66EF and this is how it turned out…
Suitably creepy…
I wasn’t happy writing it, but I was reasonably pleased with the result and I now feel encouraged to use this style on a larger piece, possibly using a variety of colours. The text I’ve used here is a short black magic spell that I found on the Internet – I think the scribbly treatment worked well with it, although I decided against using it for the envelope… I don’t believe in being mean to Postmen or Postwomen, so I wrote my usual copperplate script for these…
My next project will probably be Christmas related, if I don’t start addressing my envelopes soon it’ll be the week before Christmas and I’ll be sitting at my desk dashing off addresses with a Bic Biro – and that simply won’t do! I intend to dig out the gold ink and make merry with the red envelopes! Although I suppose I ought to get on and finish this website…. I have a page about gilding to build…and there might be a flash of gothic and a wink of foundational…
Wonky Words 