20th
February 2016 Sylvania Community Hall
We
were privileged to once again have Julie-Ann as our tutor for some specialised
VERY small writing layouts and ideas, using any or all of our favourite and/or
interesting scripts, and using a 1561-62 “Model Book of Calligraphy” by
Croatian (Hungarian) scribe, Georg Bocskay as inspiration. This
pre-eminent scribe used a vast selection of contemporary and historical scripts
to display his mastery of the range of styles known to him. The book was
later enhanced by an artist, Joris Hoefnagel, with illuminations and other
additions.
Julie-Ann
demonstrated and described many tips for media to use for such fine writing,
including the usual pencils, pens, nibs, quills, inks and ink-sticks and how to
use them, plus other quirky methods of decoration using found objects etc.
How
to sharpen the nibs with an Arkansas stone was important, and to clean the
encrusted ink off nibs, toothpaste was suggested as the finest and least
aggressive cleaner (scrape the gunge off with a scalpel); it keeps the nib
clean and sharp for the finest writing. Rule lines with a Very Sharp
Pencil.
Pre-treating
the paper with an extra external size can help stop any bleeding, also the
paper needs to be treated with a pounce of gum sandarac before writing.
The gum needs to be finely pounded in a mortar and pestle, and stored in a silk
pouch, plus kept as free from contamination as possible.
Using
good quality A5 pieces of paper, we worked on some pieces of writing using
varying ideas, layouts, and media. For the 12 of us there, it was a busy
and interesting day – in fact more time would have been nice, but we kept the 6
hours so fully occupied, that I was exhausted by the time we went home.
Julie-Ann was flat out all day and we were all appreciative of the effort put
in to construction of the workshop and the amount of information imparted.
It
was a wonderful day, and our thanks to Julie-Ann for all of her efforts.
Kath McEwen
