Calligraphy & more — the studio of Beth Lee, Bozeman, MT
“We had the sky up there, all speckled with stars, and we used to lay on our backs and stare up at them and wonder about whether they was made or only just happened.”
— from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain
Click on the thumbnail for a closer look. I’m afraid this is one that looks better in person than on screen. For one thing, the white letters in the sky are readable in real life.
Thanks to Boing-Boing for publicizing this excellent set of instructions by Liralen Li. These instructions combine clear photos with admirably precise step-by-step directions which include discussions of alternative methods along the way.
Toni‘s encouragement towards the making of a manuscript book makes me realize that maybe I’m not acknowledging what I’ve already done.
Here’s a book I made summer before last. It classifies as a manuscript book because it is hand lettered and bound, and yet I didn’t think of it in my previous blog post for several reasons:
1. It’s only 10 pages long.
2. I varied the lettering style throughout, so I never had achieve consistent lettering over the many days of work on the book.
3. I never had to deal with the flow of text from page to page, because each of the quotes existed on separate pages.
4. Although I set up a classical page layout, I then negated it somewhat by setting up a bottom line of inter-painted lettering which fell outside the page layout.
These considerations don’t necessarily detract from its classification as a manuscript book. But they do clarify for me what I want to do in my next manuscript book!
I’m thinking about manuscript books. Why?
When I first became interested in calligraphy – this was in the early ‘80s – there were very few books on the subject. Looking through my bookcase, I see some favorites that remain the cornerstone of my education in calligraphy. They all include some instruction on the design and execution of a manuscript book.
The calligraphy classic The Calligrapher’s Handbook
Marie Angel, who was a miniature painter as much as calligrapher, includes book design in two of the ten sections of her book entitled The Art of Calligraphy
And Ann Camp devotes 20 of the 82 pages of her book Pen Lettering
Lloyd Reynolds, finds space in his 60-page book Italic Calligraphy & Handwriting
And Friedrich Neuegebauer discusses book design in his inspirational book The Mystic Art of Written Forms
The persistence of the subject of manuscript books in these classics should be enough encouragement for me to embark on the design and preparation of my own manuscript book.
A couple of years ago I spent an afternoon in the Richard Harrison Collection of Calligraphy and Lettering at the San Francisco Publix Library. Wow! I sat at a long table and the librarian brought me book after book, each hand lettered and hand bound, which I could pick up and leaf through to my heart’s content. After about 4 hours of this, I staggered out of the library with pages of pencilled notes in my journal — a vain attempt to remember even a small fraction of what I’d seen. I had never even gotten to their collection of broadsides.
And yet I have never completed a traditional manuscript book of any length worth mentioning. Why is this? Perhaps the fear that this big commitment of time and energy will be rewarded with failure. Or perhaps the fear that a plain little hand lettered book will turn out not to have been worth the time.
And then I look at a site like The Medieval Bestiary, which links me to The Aberdeen Bestiary, and I’m hooked.
Where I am now in pointed-pen proficiency. I can’t delude myself that I’m any better than this: I just finished addressing about 220 double wedding envelopes. I’m certainly warmed up.
I also hope to one day achieve proper spelling in conjunction with proper writing. I do know how to spell — when I’m not looking at the letterforms themselves.
Rilke poem rendered this week. This image shows the pencil marks for the mat; the marks were erased later.
An intriguing idea, beautifully executed. Keepsake ukeleles made with materials from demolished buildings. Although a ukelele with a green blackboard back can’t possibly resonate musically, the idea of memory certainly resonates, and it’s a beautiful piece, yellow staff lines and all.
Here’s another one. There was another one — I don’t have an image for it — which was reader poem about the 2000 election. I did it as a sort of reverse to this one: white italic poem on black center, with black copperplate Election 2000 words on white. I like the idea of having the two election subjects done in a similar manner to connect events which are separated in history by 25 years.
Another one for the exhibit, which will actually happen now, I think. This one contrasts two articles from the newspaper — a 1930 article congratulating the women of Tallahassee on declining to send a bathing beauty contestant to the Miami competition, and one in 1974 discussing the new craze: streaking.
Here’s another one. Not shot straight, but that doesn’t matter. That’s gold leaf on acrylic ground for the bird, walnut and Chinese stick inks for the calligraphy, and archival inkjet for the article.