The show is hanging, the cases are filled, everything is clean and ready for the opening of the First Friday Art Walk.  All the work is done, and all we have left to do is attend the opening and enjoy the visitors, right?

Wrong!

We still have food to set out, and our artist’s statements to display on pedestals on each side of the gallery.  Fresh flowers from Linda’s garden and from mine need to be placed on the entry landing and beside the elevator.  Linda has also thoughtfully provided a guest book.

The Gallery has provided us with a large table for the food, and an empty room just off the main gallery where we can hang temporary works in progress and class exemplars; and where we can offer calligraphy demonstrations.  People can view our portfolios in that room, too.

Annette, Linda and I brought lots of supplies and papers, and set up three stations in the demonstration room, so people could walk around, observe and ask questions.  Annette had the great idea of lettering peoples’ names on bookmarks for them to take with them, and she was all set up for that.  I decided to make a finished piece from start to finish, so that people could see the process as well as the result.

Most of us arrived around 4:00 that afternoon to see to all the finishing touches, and the three young ones pitched right in manning the food table and seeing that everything was ready for guests.  Linda, Sam, Polly, Annette and I set up the demonstration room, and everyone else waited for 5:00 to greet the trickle of visitors we expected.

4:55 – The musicians on the Gallery One mezzanine started to play, startling us all, because we hadn’t realized there would be live music.  Sometimes there is, but often there is not.

5:00 – The Gallery One doors open, and it’s obvious from the din of many voices that this is going to be another popular Art Walk.

5:10 – People begin mounting the stairs to the Eveleth Green Gallery, and they just keep coming!  I had no idea that many people would be interested in a calligraphy exhibit.  Boy, was I wrong!

When I peeked out the door of the demonstration room, the gallery was packed and it stayed that way all evening.  Annette did a brisk business lettering bookmarks for people (children, especially), and lots of people watched me start my project, then came back on several occassions to see the progress.  Annette got drawn off into the gallery to visit and answer questions, and Abigail seamlessly slid into her place and commenced making bookmarks!  Linda was all set up to demonstrate, but she was having so much fun talking to visitors and answering questions that we just let her station serve as a studio setting, where people could see how a calligrapher’s studio might look right before work commenced.

7:00 – The show was supposed to end at seven, and it did thin out, but many people stayed to finish talking and asking questions, and we were not able to close the doors and go home until after 7:30.

Were we pleased with our show?  Yes!  Were we exhausted?  Yes!  Was it an incredible amount of work?  Yes!  Would we do it again?  You bet!

After the morning of hanging all the wall pieces, we were pretty tired, but we decided to press on with the displays.  Gallery One had pedestals we could use to elevate our displays to viewing height, but they had no plexiglas cubes to cover the art, and there weren’t enough pedestals to display all the books and educational materials we wanted to use.

One of our members, Paulette, was not dismayed.  She contacted the Clymer Museum of Art (right next door) and was told we could borrow some pedestals and cubes from them if we could move them ourselves.  There’s an elevator in Gallery One, but not in the Clymer, and the pedestals would have to be moved by hand downstairs and onto the sidewalk, into the Gallery One elevator and up to the Eveleth Green Gallery!

Enter the knights in shining armor!  Abigail and Grace’s father and brothers volunteered to provide the muscle, and the deed was done.  Many thanks, guys.

After cleaning the pedestals and the insides of the cubes, we arranged the lower pedestals against the walls, and the three large tall pedestals in a wide triangle in the center of the gallery floor, with room for people to examine the displays from all sides.

Into the lower cases we put larger examples of books members of our guild have made, and in two of the tall cases in the center of the gallery, we displayed smaller examples of bookarts, as well as pages from an alphabet book project we worked on as a group a couple of years ago.

The third tall pedestal was reserved for Linda’s stunning collection of antique calligraphy tools, quills (both cut and uncut), powdered pigments and other tools of the trade.  This display created a real buzz during the opening of the show, and it was gratifying to see the interest in our craft.

All that was left to do was to arrange the entrance to our show, clean the outsides of the cubes, gather up the miscellaneous hanging equipment, sweep the floor, and go home to rest up for the opening night party!

Piece of cake!

Our third young calligrapher is Abigail, and she has been with our guild for several years.  She started coming to guild meetings when she was 11, and she is now 16.

Abigail is also represented in our show  ‘Written on the Wind’.  She has a perpetual calendar page (August), done when she was just 12, and a recent work “Joy”, that shows her maturing style.

It has been great fun watching Abigail grow from a quiet child to the self-posessed and confident young woman she is today, as well as watching her calligraphic journey; from the desire to make beautiful letters to the accomplishment.

Abigail is a very artistic young woman who draws and paints as well as practicing the art of calligraphy.  She loves flowers, especially roses, and adorns her calligraphy pieces with her art.  I’m sure her many friends look forward to her hand-written cards and letters, complete with calligraphy and artwork.

Like many beginning calligraphers, Abigail started using a calligraphy pen in the style of her own handwriting, but she quickly caught on to the idea of having several distinctive hands at her disposal.  Abigail has a good eye for form, and she is now able to analyze not only her letterforms, but her spacing and design work.

Abby has progressed to the point where she can now use several calligraphic styles, and is able to design more complicated pieces to express her vision.  Abigail loves using color in her work, and is showing quite a bit of sophistication in her color choices as well as in her graphic interpretations.

Abigail is turning into a wonderful teacher, and she’s a great role-model for the two younger children in the guild.  Never afraid of responsibility, she’s also recently taken it upon herself to send out email reminders to the guild regarding our meetings, workshops and activities.  Abby keeps us all on track!

Grace is one of the newest members of WindWriters.  Like Claire, she just turned 11, and also like Claire she has a calligraphy piece in ‘Written on the Wind’.  Grace and Claire are the best of friends and do many things together.

Grace has not yet started learning formal calligraphy , although she has tried out the edged pen on several occassions.  Grace is a ‘lefty’, so she has several difficulties with the edged pen that most right-handed writers never encounter.  We had a guild meeting yesterday, and Grace had an opportunity to work with an edged pen during our practice session.  She seemed to be overcoming the difficulties quite well.

Since children learn so easily, and their habits are not ingrained, this could be a good reason to start them on calligraphy early.

There are many fine calligraphers who are left-handed; they just have to learn to position their papers and writing hands differently.  There are also special oblique-cut nibs made especially for left-handed calligraphers.  And there are two calligraphic hands that seem custom made for left-handed writers.  They are English Roundhand and Spencerian Script.  Left-handed writers can use a flexible pointed pen in a regular straight penholder, and don’t have to learn to use the awkward seeming offset penholder, nor do they have to turn their lines of writing almost vertical and write uphill from bottom to top, as many right-handed calligraphers do.

Two members of our guild (Shelly and Michelle) write beautiful roundhand, and I’m hoping they will be able to get Grace started in this lovely hand.  Grace’s older sister Abigail (also a member of WindWriters) would be able to help her at home, and in no time, Grace could be addressing wedding invitations with the best of them!

If this seems overly optimistic to those calligraphers who have never tried English Roundhand, let me just say that it is a mesmerizing, almost addictive, hand to write.  It’s hard to stop practicing!

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we have three young calligraphers in our guild and I would like to introduce them.  The youngest is Claire, who turned 11 a few weeks ago.  Claire has been learning calligraphy from several members of our guild, expecially from Linda, who gave her a wonderful start.

Claire put two pieces of calligraphy in our show ‘Written on the Wind’, which is now hanging in the Eveleth Green Gallery here in Ellensburg.  That in itself is special, in that such a young person has already had work shown in a recognized fine art gallery.

What is even more special is that one of her pieces of calligraphy sold  the opening night of the show!

Claire has been learning and practicing her calligraphic skills for less than a year.  She’s a little perfectionist and we all think that she, as well as our other two young people will be fine calligraphers.  They are developing a skill that they can practice throughout their lifetimes.

Claire is already delighting her friends and family members with hand-lettered cards and quotations.  As she progresses, she will likely learn more hands, and be able to design and execute ever more complicated projects.

As established calligraphers, it’s very gratifying to the  members of our guild to have young people who are interested in learning what we have to offer, and we welcome them (literally) with open arms.  It’s delightful to think that these young calligraphers will be helping to carry on a tradition of beautiful writing that has been handed down to us from ancient times.

We’re looking forward to seeing what Claire will do in the world of calligraphy, and also to helping her on her way.