Calligraphy Summer Exhibition
Last week the lights went down on the 2024 South London Lettering Association’s annual calligraphy exhibition. When I was last keeping a practice journal I wasn't calling myself a calligrapher let alone submitting calligraphy work for public exhibition. It's perhaps the clearest way to look back and see the evolution over the 10 years since I quit my civil service job to do art full time. I went into art college as a hobbyist quilter, I came out as a fibre artist with a load of unpulled threads hanging around my practice. A whole load of life intervened and now here we are, finally in a rhythm with my artwork I have never had before.
My practice still has unpulled threads but it's from a more secure place. I still have much exploration to do about combining my gestural expression with the formal calligraphy scripts I'm now learning. This gave me a lot of questions about what exactly I should submit to a “calligraphy exhibition”. Which art pieces express my use of calligraphic elements in the best and most interesting way? Which might an audience of very experienced calligraphers most appreciate? Is my formal calligraphy good enough to include or will I be embarrassed??
Headspinng for a few weeks got me here: to two ‘art pieces’ and two ‘calligraphy pieces’. This first one is formal italic and a poem I wrote as an ode to my calligraphy tutor (I haven't asked her opinion on it yet mind you!!)
The second piece I submitted was a piece of gestural calligraphy, which was exploring how the shape and rhythm of words can create a texture in and of itself. I love my ruling pens and this one, written with my favourite Brody pen, is a great example of what a beautiful line a ruling pen can give.
I couldn't resist putting in what I'd call a ‘pure art’ piece, and this next one got a lot of positive feedback so I'm glad I did. It was from a series of water paintings done with huge sweeping strokes - very minimalist - like a visual haiku of sorts.
Lastly, and my most favourite piece of all, probably because of the sheer amount of time it took to make is ‘The Practice Book'. It is a handmade flag book constructed from sheets of calligraphy practice from when I did my CLAS italic certificate this spring. It was a collection of lots of new learning particularly for the bookbinding skills. So very glad I got this finished in time for the exhibition.
It's all over for 2024 but I am very glad I took the time to send things in my first year as a member. Will need to keep an eye out on more calligraphy exhibitions in the future. What's the next one to aim for I wonder?
Angelique
