filigree – Page 20

Flowers

Being inspired by the filigree pattern used in my latest initial, I decided to reuse it to create a small illumination, this time with ferro-gallic ink and wallnut stain to remain close to the shade of the kraft paper.

To see the whole work, click here.

Initial C

A recent happy occasion “forced” me to take my nib and to make one of those filigree initials I like so much.
It’s to celebrate the birth of a little girl and after rejecting the pink, I eventually chose the white.
Here is a picture of a part of the initial where one can see the shiny texture of the letter (which I love !).

And another picture which reveals my industrial secret, in other words, the draft 😉

to see the whole final work, follow the link to the gallery.

… a little natural whiteness

Here is a new version of a text by André Gide that I already calligraphied for my professor.
This time I took only the last part of the text and wrote without any ruling to guide me. As for the decoration, I reused an embossed stained glass pattern previously utilized in other works.

To see the whole work, follow the link to the gallery.

The Flies – final version

I’ve just finished with my version of the text from The Flies by Jean-Paul Sartre.

You can see the whole work by clicking here.

As it is quite long, one cannot really see anything on this pic, that’s why I took close-ups :

Back to basics

All coaches will tell you that when nothing works, you have to go back to basics.
So here is a new flower, a pattern of my own composition that I have already practiced a number of times.
It is 5 cm in diameter, on handmade paper, gilding with gold leaf, alizarin lacquer and gum arabic for the background, iron gall ink for the filigree

I’m not unhappy with the result, it gives me confidence to start working on new compositions and I needed it because of my last drafts!

The flies

A draft, made a long time ago.
These are selected bits from the play Les Mouches by Sartre. I used different gothic scripts for the different characters.
The obvious things to do for the final version are :

use a paper a little better than this one
remove the red versals, stay in monochrome + gold, maybe insert some cadels instead
revise the script used for Orestes and Electra
add a few more lines
and do it all on a paper big enough to have only one column!

If all goes well, the final version will be released this summer.

Monochromatic flower

A new version of the flower pattern I invented, based on filigrees.

I love M

Another filigree initial and another M.
It seems that the people who commission me to write initials all have names beginning with the same letter.
A bit tired of using the Lombard form, I opted this time for an older form, inspired by the ms. 0202 of the Mazarine library (12th century).

Stained glass window

A few months ago, during a visit to Quimper, I was admiring the stained glass windows of the cathedral when the idea came up to use them for a composition.
So here is a first variation on the theme (I think there will be more).

Know Thyself

… and thou shalt know the universe and God.

This phrase has been on my list of things to calligraph for several years. After several attempts at very different compositions, I think I have found what suits this phrase affixed to the pediment of the temple of the oracle at Delphi.

Of course, it’s the French version here 🙂