The Art of Written Communication - Kentucky 4-H
←
→
Page content transcription
If your browser does not render page correctly, please read the page content below
May 2021 The Art of Written Communication From Hieroglyphics to Times New Roman font, our society has held the need to deliver information through written communication. Within the scope of written communication, there are opportunities for added style and creativity, giving way to an opportunity for artistic influence. The art of written language includes calligraphy, typography, handwriting, penmanship, hand lettering, and graphology. Certainly, as our world has plunged into the technology age there is far less opportunity or need for beautifully written penmanship, carefully connected cursive letters flowing seamlessly, or the flourish of a crafted unique signature. We are now communicating on keyboards, smartphones, and tablets. We can send a text and expect an immediate response. Did you know handwriting can lead to better grades, help your brain connect and process information, exercise your visual, motor, and memory circuits, build hand-eye coordination, and practice fine motor skills? There’s a direct link between writing skills and academic success. So, writing that 4-H speech on paper with a pen or pencil has many added benefits. Handwriting your speech on note cards when you run for club officer may deliver more advantages than if you type it on a computer. Since youth leadership is the superpower of 4-H, could 4-H become a part of a resurgence of a dying art form? If the current trend of today’s youth is to embrace all things retro, vintage, throwbacks, antiques along with mindfulness and artful living, could 4-H help the pendulum swing back to recapture the art of writing? This month’s activity is Calligraphy. On 8 ½ by 11 paper, rewrite a quote, poem or pledge using Calligraphy. Make sure to include the author on the piece. This is a Kentucky 4-H State fair exhibit. You can find more information here: 4-H Arts
This month’s activity: Use Hand Lettering Techniques to Make Calligraphy
You can find other activities here: http://cedik.ca.uky.edu/arts-engagement-resources
Kentucky Artist Spotlight: Thomas Freese
http://www.thomaslfreese.com/artist.html
Some Additional Kentucky Arts Resources:
The Kentucky Arts Council
http://artscouncil.ky.gov/
The Kentucky Arts Council is the state arts agency and is responsible for developing and promoting support for the arts
in Kentucky.
Kentucky Nonprofit Network
https://www.kynonprofits.org/
The Kentucky Nonprofit Network is Kentucky's state association of nonprofits. KNN provides quality education, sharing
of best practices and resources, time and money-saving member benefits, and a unified public policy voice.
Governor’s School for the Arts
https://www.kentuckyperformingarts.org/education/governors-school-for-the-arts
The Kentucky Center Governor's School for the Arts (GSA) is a three-week summer program for rising juniors and
seniors in the state of Kentucky.
Ky Art Education Association
https://www.kyarted.net/
The mission of the Kentucky Art Education Association (KyAEA) is to advance art education through professional
development, service, the advancement of knowledge, and leadership.
This newsletter is a partnership between the College of Agriculture, Food &
Environment and the College of Fine Arts, to provide content at the intersection
of youth & the arts to Kentucky Cooperative Extension Agents.
Contact Stephanie Richards or Jen Tackett for more information
For more arts education related content for Kentucky audiences, check out
Kentucky Arts Extension http://cedik.ca.uky.edu/arts-extension
For more youth development content check out Kentucky 4-H https://4-h.ca.uky.edu/
Use hand lettering techniques
to make
Calligraphy
What is Calligraphy?
Calligraphy has developed as a handwriting art across the globe throughout history.
Egyptian heiroglyphics, manuscripts from the Middle Ages and many East Asian
writing systems are all examples of calligraphy.
Calligraphy is similar to hand lettering but usually describes cursive script where
each letter flows into the next, while hand lettering allows for each letter to be
created uniquely.
You can make your handwriting beautiful and expressive by learning basic
calligraphy and hand-lettering techniques.
What materials do I need?
You will need a calligraphy pen holder with a selection of nibs and ink OR round
brushes and watercolor paint, paper towels and water.
Smooth, thick paper that is gridded or lined can be helpful to practice the size of
your letters. You can make your own lined paper with a pencil and a rolling ruler.
If you don’t have calligraphy pens, brush-tipped calligraphy markers are an easy
way to learn the basics of calligraphy.
What are the benefits?
Calligraphy is an inexpensive, meditative and relaxing way to build fine motor skills
and memory retention.
Expressing yourself through artful handwriting engages critical thinking and
confidence building skills that will last a lifetime.
Calligraphy can be used in decorative projects, calendars and journals that offer
expressive and organizational opportunities. Calligraphy can also be used in the
creation of unique gifts for others which strengthens relationships.
1 Prepare your Paper
Smooth, thick paper will help your writing tool or brush glide easily and will prevent ink or
watercolor paint from bleeding through. A slightly textured calligraphy paper will help “catch”
ink and keep it from spreading but rough or heavily textured paper will give more resistance as
you make your strokes.
Guidelines and sketching are the way calligraphy is completed and perfected. If your paper
has no lines, it may be helpful to create some using a rolling or regular ruler. You can create
horizontal lines and diagonal lines to help you to keep your letters at the same height and
angle. A rolling ruler will keep your grid lines even. You can make your gridlines in pencil so
that they can be erased later.
If you are starting out with grid or lined paper, you are ready to proceed to the next step.
2 Select and Prepare your Writing Tool
Calligraphy Pen: Using a pen is the traditional and most commonly used method of
calligraphy. Calligraphy pens are a specific type of fountain pen with wider and flatter nibs that
produce greater variation in line thickness.
To ink your pen, dip the point of the calligraphy pen, called the nib, into the ink, so that
the hole in the top, the vent, fills. To get the nib to open you should hold the pen in
between your thumb and first finger, and the angle of the pen needs to be angled close to
the paper, around 45 degress.
Calligraphy Brush: A long bristled round bamboo brush is the preferred type of calligraphy
brush, but any brush with bristles that come to a pointed tip will work for calligraphy.
Dip the brush into ink or dark watercolor paint and pull the bristles against the edge
to form a point and remove the excess liquid. This will also help you avoid accidentally
splattering the ink or paint onto the paper. Keep paper towels nearby just in case.
Brush-tipped Marker, Regular Marker, Regular Pen, Pencil or Chalk: Solid tipped
writing tools like these can be used in Faux Calligraphy, which is a way to re-create the effect
of calligraphy by duplicating downstrokes.
These fine/solid-tipped writing devices require no preparation.
3 Begin Practicing Strokes
Practice making upstroke lines and downstroke lines on your paper. With a calligraphy pen,
firm pressure causes the tines (either side of the nib) to open and allow ink to flow. When your
brush, pen or brush-tipped marker travels toward your body in a downstroke, press down
firmly and the lines will become thicker. On upstrokes, when the brush or pen moves away
from your body, apply less pressure and use just the tip of the brush or pen to produce a thin
hairline. Practice making rows and rows of only downstrokes first. Then switch to upstrokes.
4 Learn your A, B, C’s
It will take practice to adjust the amount of pressure you apply as you move the pen/brush.
After you’ve mastered up and downstrokes, start by choosing a single upper-case letter in
either cursive or block print. You can adjust the angle of the letter using the grid and draw
arrows around the letter as a guide for which will be thin upstrokes and which will be thick
downstrokes.
Discover what it takes to build that letter and how the strokes connect. Repeat the same
letter until they begin to look uniform. Fill a whole page with that letter. You will eventually
be able to write smoothly and without thinking too hard. The key is to concentrate and work
with a slow, steady hand.
Next, repeat that process with another uppercase letter. And another, until you have written
the whole alphabet in a consistent way. The style is up to you, but try to keep the whole
alphabet looking similar. This can be meditative and relaxing as you start to get a feel for the
pens and brushes in your hand.
Once your upper-case alphabet is complete, use these same steps to master the lowercase
alphabet.
5 Try Faux Calligraphy
If you do not have a brush, calligraphy pen or brush-tipped marker, you can still create
letters that imitate the beautiful form of calligraphy with a fine solid tipped writing tool like
a pencil, regular marker, regular pen or chalk. It is a great technique if you want to write on
surfaces where you cannot use regular calligraphy tools, like wood, glass and chalkboards.
To create faux calligraphy, make your letters as you
normally would and then add a duplicate line next to each
downstroke. Remember to use directional arrows if you
need to. You can practice with a pencil first and go over
your letters with a marker after you erase any stray marks.
Some people choose to leave their letters with the “hollow”
look but you can also fill in the empty space with your pen,
pencil, marker or chalk to replicate classic calligraphy.
6 Put it all Together.
Now that you have practiced your
alphabet, you can start putting words
and phrases together. Many people
start by writing their name. With
enough repetition, you may be able to
graduate beyond grid paper.
Put your new skills to the test by writing
a favorite poem or thank-you note on
a card and giving it as a gift to a friend
or family member. Try addressing the
envelope using calligraphy too. Your
loved ones will appreciate your hard
work.
If you keep a journal, you can practice
writing in an artful way, day after day.
Or enhance your living space by using
your new hand-lettering skills to create
a large piece of art with an inspirational
message to hang on the wall.
Play around by adding color to your
calligraphy. You can start your writing
on colored paper. Bold paints and
markers can also be used to brighten
up your designs.
7
Take it further...
...by studying written language.
Many East Asian written languages are composed of logograms, a written character
that represents a whole word rather a single letter. In Mandarin this written language
is call hanzi. Using calligraphy to artfully draw Mandarin characters is called shufa,
“the way of writing”. Incredible works of art have been created using this technique.
Calligraphic art in many cultures is even more highly prized than paintings and
sculptures.
If you enjoy learning about other languages and cultures, language and art history
courses could help you develop this interest. As you study the language, you can
experiment by using a brush and watercolor paint to recreate East Asian language
characters.
Wu Changshuo (1844-1927)
...by decorating cookies. Calligraphy in Stone Drum Script
Use faux calligraphy in cookie decorating to make beautiful
and delicious treats. All you need is a great cookie recipe,
some royal icing and piping bags. Put a layer of icing on
the cookie and let it harden before adding lettering to the
cookie with a very small round icing tip. Once you have
made your faux letters, fill in the gaps with the icing and
share with friends!
www.sweetsugarbelle.com
...by painting with calligraphy.
Take inspiration from nature by painting a leaf, tree or fruit using calligraphy brush
techniques. Things that you can easily recall from memory make great subjects or you www.joanngroff.com
can arrange a still life with items you’ve collected. Play with line thickness to develop
rhythm in the painting.
...by studying typography.
You may not realize it, but fonts used in typing are
Upload
your art
Aa
created by artists too. Exploring the way letters
w
are formed and spaced to be easily read and
to socia ork
reproduced can be helpful as you develop your
personal style of calligraphic script. Search for l media
different calligraphy fonts online and notice how and sha
different letters are formed, how they are angled, re your
how tall they are and how they are spaced. Try to creation
Amarillo font,
replicate a few different styles of lettering. !
Francis John S. Villo, 2016
Key Terms Calligraphy marker: markers that come in a range of tips and colors that allow you to create a variety of narrow and broad strokes, for unique and stunning results. Calligraphy paper: paper with a slightly textured surface that grabs the ink and prevents smearing and spreading throughout the paper. Cursive Script: any style of penmanship in which some characters are written joined together in a flowing manner, generally to make writing faster, but can also be used for artful effect. Downstroke: when the tip of the pen, brush or marker travels downward toward the body where increased pressure is applied and a thicker line is produced. Faux Calligraphy: a way of drawing letters that imitate the thick and thin strokes of calligraphy using a solid- tipped writing tool. Gridlines: a sketch outline of the guide you set yourself to follow for your writing, made with a ruler or rolling ruler. Hand lettering: a style of lettering related to calligraphy where each letter is creately uniquely and placed to achieve a desired effect in an overall composition, often seen on signs and chalkboards. Hairline: the thinnest strokes made with a calligraphy pen, marker or brush. Ink: there are three types of ink made for calligraphy; fountain pen ink, dip ink, and Japanese/Chinese stick ink. Fountain pen inks are specially for fountain pens, while dip ink and Japanese/Chinese stick ink are used with dip pens. Logogram: a written character or symbol that represents a word or phrase. Nib: metal tip that attaches to the pen handle that holds ink. Pen holder: the calligraphy pen handle. Rolling ruler: a ruler that contains a cylinder much like a rolling pin inside, allowing it to “roll” along a sheet of paper or other surface where it is being used. Tines: either side of the nib of a calligraphy pen. Typography: the style, arrangement, and appearance of the letters, numbers, and symbols to make written language legible, readable and appealing. Upstroke: when the tip of the pen, brush or marker travels upward on the page away from the body where decreased pressure is applied and a thinner hairline is produced. Vent: the tip of the nib that fills with ink when dipped.
You can also read
