MC & G

They said yes to each other yesterday and we were there to see that. We had a marvelous day.

Now, I can show you the monogram I made for them.

To see the whole thing, just have a look to the gallery.

And, as one has to dress a bit for a wedding, I made this chain mail tie, quite nice even if a bit heavy :-)

For my wife's neck, I chose something a bit lighter, I made her this pendant of slate, engraved with a filigree pattern and gilded with gold powder.

filigrees

Back to paperwork for an initial with filigrees. This is only a detail first because it isn't finished yet and second because I don't want to spoil the surprise for the person who will receive it.

The dark red circle is approximatively 2cm in diameter and I used a pattern found in the MS Espagnol 33 from the BNF, manuscript that we will study during this summer courses in my workshop.

peebles & filigrees

A first engraved pebble with a filigree pattern from the Ms Espagnol 33 from the French National Library.

And a second one, smaller, made as a pendant. My wife's loving it !

Scribbles

a few weeks ago, I went to an art show. A good time but, at a point, one gets bored. Thus, I scribbled.

Ok, these are scribbles but not only... They also are warm-up for my next workshop on filigrees.

I only regret that I didn't have time to fill in the last square...

DIY

I had a few easels, wooden and small ones. They didn't stay right, were fragile, kind of bulls**t.
As I had an exhibition coming fast, I decided that I needed something more resistant so ... here is the result :

It doesn't resemble to anything but it's not a problem. 80cm of electric wire, carefully bent and here I am, perfectly stable, solid and almost invisible easels. The only problem may be the color but I had some red wire and no time to go and buy some other.

And, as I'm a very gentle guy, here is another cadel letter, this time it's an L.

more cadels

Another long weekend and here are more cadels.

A Cadel E

and a K :

Both are, once more, inspired by the Ms AN II 3 from the Basel Library.

To see more pics, just have a look to the gallery.

S

A good thing with 3 days long weekends is that one have time to work on things :

A new cadel initial, once more inspired by the  Ms AN II 3 from the library of the university in Basel.

There will be more of these ...

sub products

No, I didn't disappear, nor have I stopped to calligraph.
I'm working, to prove it, here are some sub products of my ongoing works (which I won't show for the moment).

These are only "trash", created by doing something totally different but it gives me ideas ...

Albertus

I know I don't post very often these last weeks but it's because of spring, spring & garden. And this means a lot of work.
I nevertheless continue to work on different projects (even if they have a very tiny link with calligraphy) & I consequently have the pleasure of introducing Albertus (he's missing 1 & a half arm but that will probably be solved shortly).

He also has no head (I'll find one) and no legs but that's not necessary :-)

snow ?

Subproduct of an ongoing work

Merci

An M to say thank you (in french we say merci).

I designed the cadel from patterns previously seen in different manuscripts.

And, as you would have guessed, it's been done with electro etching on tin.

knitting

Winter is coming. I know spring has just begun but, winter is coming.
I consequently decided to get myself to knitting. As I just can't cope with needles and wool, I opted for steel and copper so as to make myslef a scarf for winter (cos it's coming !!).

I doubt it can keep me warm, but until then, it keeps me busy :-)

Circles

No, I'm not forgetting you, neither do I forgot calligraphy.
The fact is that I have quite a lot of work right now and that I'm working on a new project I can't tell you about for the moment.
As a starter, just a pic :

weekend report

An ill apple tree cut, 20 m² of ground digged, 5 rose bush and an orange tree transplanted, lots of other maintenance works in the garden... To make it short, I spent all my weekend in the garden.
But, as I woke up early, I found time to etch a new cadel initial, inspired by the same manuscript as the previous one (Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, AN II 3).

It's quite different from the cadel initials I already made & I like it.

I think I'll made other ones inspired by the same manuscript but the priority now is the maintenance of the garden :-)

Cadel initial

Spring is coming and my garden requests all of my time, so no time to do calligraphy. But, surfing on the web, I came accross a manuscript with quite a lot of cadel initials and could not resist. So here is a new cadel initial, inspired by the Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, AN II 3, an initial P, as usual, acid-etched on zinc.

I'm quite happy with it, partly because I could make it smaller than the previous ones without loosing the quality of the etching. It is 6 cm high.

Soon more initials inspired by the same manuscript, if gardening does not take all my spare time :-)

Kakemono or makimono ?

My latest work, filigrees made with acrylic paint on cloth, is going on.
I don't have any plan, I just draw things as they come. But, I were to make a kakemono and now, I feel it looks much better as a makimono. As it isn't finished yet, I can still change my mind.

What do you think ?

Iron vine

After having etched a iron plate with a manhole cover pattern, I thought it could be interesting to electro-etch medieval patterns on the same material.

Here is my first try, a white vine.

It's not bad but the sharpeness needs to be enhanced, I have to find another varnish allowing smaller details and also a way to get the plate to rust homogeneously.

Know thyself

An umpteenth version of this sentence engraved on the Oracle's temple in Delphi : Know thyself.

This time, I mixed an embossed roman capital with its greek counterpart, letterred on tin and electro-etched to show the hidden parts of the roman caps.

I'm very happy with the result, already thinking of new works using the same technique. Impatient !!!

To see the whole thing, click here. The pic is not very good, it's difficult to get enough light to reveal the whole etching :-\

Filigrees on cloth

It's been a long time since I last worked on cloth and, right now, I'm just longing for it...

I forgot how long it is to get things done on cloth, this is what I achieved after 3 hours of work :-)

work in progress

Just to prove that I'm still working, even if (or maybe because) I don't post a lot on this blog.
Here is a pic of my latest work, still in progress and far from being finished.

There' some greek in it but not only and it's a sentence I already worked on. For the time being, I won't tell you more about it ...

:-)

Clams again

I promise, this this the last time I give voice to clams (until next time). This time their messages are full of love and care.

On the other hand, I'm working on new projects, so, soon new pics of real calligraphy with real texts

claming clams

New messages from our friends the clams

Ok, the last one does not really speak english, it's a word to word translation of the french for holy cow !  ;-)

Limits

A new work, etching again but this time acid-etching on zinc.
It's a sentence from the play Morts Sans sépulture by Jean-Paul Sartre.
I wanted to have a gash between the beginning of the sentence and the last words, I consequently had to keep the plate in the acid for quite a long time, resulting in holes in other parts of the plate.

But I find the result good, the texture and the look of the plate responds to the text and the spacing between the lines is not a problem either.

I still have to add the name of the author and I will be done with this work :-)

One is alone...

...with everything one loves.

It's NOVALIS who said that in his Fragments. I find this sentence beautiful but its shortness makes it difficult to do something with it so I worked on it in the same spirit as the previous short phrases (eg the ones from Wittgentstein, Eluard, Oscar Wilde or Rilke).

As I've been playing a lot with electro-etching lately, I decided to recycle tin boxes for this project.

To add some variety, I drew the first part of the sentence with typographic shapes, one letter per bit of metal, and wrote the second part with an italian script of the XVIth century (many thanks to my master, Keith Adams, who taught me everything I know about it).

So as to vary the textures, I ended by applying different operations to some of the metal bits like :

rust

heating

I quite like the result and I think I'll continue with electro-etching & recycling :-)

Man hole cover

Today, the first item of a serie that I hope to be numerous, a copy of a man hole cover pattern, electroetched on steel.

The cut is 3mm thick and 8cm in diameter, the perfect object to be used as a non breakable beer mat ;-)

happy new year

I didn't post a lot lately. Partly because I had no time, partly because I'm lazy and partly because I was busy creating new stuff.
To apologize, I wish you happiness, health and prosperity for this new year.
And, as for a new start, here is a how to create a wish thing with a minimum of material and by recycling daily things.

1- take a lid from a jam pot (or other lid from other pot, beans is also a good choice).

2- draw, calligraph your text, pattern, thing with a marker on the lid.

3- Remove the paint with a nail (like the one that can been seen on the bottom right of the image) or any other tool suitable.

4- Once the pattern totally clean from the paint, use a battery connected to cotton bud to electro-etch the cleaned surfaces.

5- To remove the remaining paint, you can sand the lid or, if you're as lazy as I am, just use a soldering lamp to burn the paint (beware of the fumes, probably very toxic !)

You'll have to end with a bit of sanding with a emery cloth and that's it !

Once you've taken a good pic of your etched lid, everyone will envy you :-)

And if you prefer something more traditionnal, here are Jacques Brel's wishes on January 1978.