Well, OK. I'm about three weeks early in declaring a year of calligraphy, but considering this is the second card I make for my Viennese friend, I'll call it a year.
I'm going to try and not get weepy and retrospective-y, but I'll still talk about the past year to start off. I didn't think, a year ago, that I would be doing this so much. I mean, sure, calligraphy was/is always going to be a hobby, but I never imagined that it would pick up so fast. Granted, the summer was slow (mainly because I was in Hungary for a month--that tends to slow down calligraphic production), but I did complete six projects this past year. Which seems like very little, but four of those were completed within the past three months. Not a bad rate of production. I also did a number of smaller projects (three Christmas cards, and one birthday card. Nothing really special about them). I taught the grade 8s at one of my schools to do a little bit of calligraphy, and will be doing so again. I introduced calligraphy to the grade 9s at my other school, and have been encouraged to launch a calligraphy club at school next year. I created a decent-sized project, and completed it, without too many flaws, in a short time. And I launched this blog, which, if we go by page views, has gotten a bit of exposure (who's reading my blog in Russia and the Ukraine?!)
End sentimentalness.
In my past projects, I had trouble working out how to adapt patterns to my ideas, or resizing them (it's true. It didn't occur to me to use a photocopier to resize). This really limited my ability to create something. The design element had to be the right size, in the right place, for it to work. This was why I had fallen back on frames for my second and third project--they were easy to adapt, and, frankly, didn't cause me headaches. I don't know what happened, but I started looking at designs, and going "if I shrink this, I can use that element without a problem." I was now able to use more design elements on a sheet, and still have sufficient space to write. Of course, this being Hungarian embroidery based, I am still restricted to using elements from one region on one sheet. In other words, I can't mix a Sióagárdi element with a Kalocsai element. This time around, as seems to be turning into tradition, I've picked a Kalocsai design from an apron (no, Hungarian aprons weren't "Kiss the Cook" or some such. Or at least, they weren't traditionally.) Aprons were everyday wear in Hungary, although there were often some retained for more formal occasions, like Sunday Mass. The full pattern for this apron (well, this part) was the design at the base of the sheet, with a "bouquet" of three roses at the top. I chose to use the design at the base, and one of the roses as a header.
It's funny. I don't consider myself intrinsically artistic (far from it), and I couldn't create a design from scratch, but within 30 seconds I can look at an embroidery pattern, and decide not only whether it will suit a project, but also what elements will be used, and how. It's like "This is a nice one. S/He will like this. I'll put that there, and that there." The writing is a whole different story.
The tracing, lining, and colouring, as usual, took me little time. A few hours, in total. Of course, considering my time was mainly spent working on "Panic Mode"(qv.), "Orchids" was worked on when I was unable to continue with "Panic Mode". Once "Panic Mode" was finished and mailed away, I could get down to focusing on the more perplexing aspect of "Orchids": the writing. Previously, I'd gotten away with three texts. But I didn't want to start recycling the texts too soon, so I had to find something. I was hoping to find another traditional greeting/blessing, but wasn't having much luck with that. Thankfully, some people put together a few webpages that contained a lot of greetings, wishes, and the such (here, I'll admit I'm not very poetic, either.)
I found a nice greeting that essentially said "may you always smile, never cry, and always have a happy birthday" (told you I'm not poetic. A translation would have been horrid).
What originally got me interested in calligraphy was illuminated manuscripts. Being a bibliophile and a history buff, it was only a matter of time before I discovered these masterpieces. And I don't know what it is, exactly, but I have a preference for Early and High Middle Ages works (Lindisfarne Gospels, Book of Kells, Képes Krónika, Macclesfield Psalter (although the two latter ones are towards the end of my interest)), as a result, I tend to prefer working with uncial, insular, and Carolingian scripts (and occasionally italic). Gothic, due to how slowly it is written, and its angularity (often causing it to be nearly illegible in its most formal form) is a script I had so far avoided. However, I was worried about writing myself into a corner (yes, that was a bad pun), so I looked at a wider range of scripts.
Every once in a while, I wonder why I have so many books on scripts (I currently have eleven, of which two to four are more studies of historical calligraphy than 'how-to' books), especially since there are really only a few unique scripts (Roman majuscule, Uncial, Insular, Carolingian, Gothic, Italic, and !@#$% Copperplate), and just about everything else is variations of those main types. Of course, these variations come in useful, when one is only found in a single book. I had been hesitating to use Gothic, because of its characteristics, but one of my books had a script called "Cursive Gothic". 'Cursive' only in the sense that it could be written faster than "regular" Gothic. But it suited my purpose: it was a script different from what I had used before, it was legible, and I felt it would be suitable. I'd also realized that since red is a very common colour in the designs, I would have a tendency to write in red ink (so there would be no clash between the writing and the design), but really... Not every project needs to be in red, does it? Out of all the colours in the design, the next most common colour was green. I didn't have an ink that matched the shade of the light green (I'd have to blend inks to do that. Another skill I have yet to learn), so I matched the dark green.
I'm actually happy with this one (and so is she, and that's what's important).
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