Capital Letters and Calligraphy Practice

Here I am practicing capital letters in my Calligraphy class.  It was difficult and I need lots of practice but anything worth doing is worth doing well.  

This is me practicing last week using a variety of nibs and different inks.  If you have followed me on my blog you know that I am an art supply junkie so of course learning a new media is just an opportunity to purchase new supplies.  LOL.  My daughter and I have been taking this class together and she has been thrilled that I have so many art supplies because that means that she doesn't have to purchase as many supplies.  But I've tried Sumi Ink, colored inks, parallel pens, and a variety of nibs.  If you look carefully you will see all of these supplies used on these pieces.  

These two books are my favorites so far.  They are informative and definitely give tons of information about the art form.  I recommend these highly. Iv'e been using them weekly since purchasing them.



Two of the inks that I've found that I love.  Make sure that you rinse and clean the Sumi ink off of your nibs right away.  If not then I've used a little toothpaste and a toothbrush and it cleaned right off.



Speedball nibs are so far my favorite, they are easy to use and give me a fine line when needed.  Next post I will share a few more nibs that I've found that I really like.

If you want to try a great fountain calligraphy pen, I love these.


So far this is my favorite gold watercolor to use with Calligraphy.  It flows off of the pen well and produces a lovely gold color on the paper.  I've also used these in watercolor and they are amazing there as well.  More to come with these.  Love them.

Picasso and Monet, Some of my Favorite Resource Books for kids.

I've used both of these book while teaching.  Laurence Anholt writes books which are based on fact and teaches children about the artist in a fun entertaining way.  I'm planning to do children's classes using both of these books in the future.  Take a look at these, they are so fun and are definitely some of my favorite resources for children.

Showcasing a preview of my newest soon to be released online class.

 I'm in the process of putting together a series of online classes showcasing  projects which I use now and used when I was teaching.  These are kid tested and teacher approved  where children can complete the project on their own while feeling success.  These will be available in the near future on my website but thought I'd give you a sneak peek of some of the resources which I use now as an artist and used in the classroom with my students.  These are just a few of those.

Lawrence Anholt has a series of books which are based on fact about a number of famous artists.  Kids love them and get a taste of the artists life and artwork.  The two titles shown below will be listed as resources in the first online class explaining how to develop a one point perspective drawing.

The Art of Perspective is an amazing resource for all artists and goes into detail about the different ways to use perspective in your art.  I own this book and used it as a teacher and as an artist.  I would recommend it highly.




I'm in the process of filming my one point perspective class as we speak and hope to have it out sometime this spring.

Here is the sample project for the online one point perspective class.  I hope you or your child will join me.  These classes are designed for kids to work on independently but also a parent can join in and have a shared experience.

If you are interested and would like to get supplies ready click on the links to purchase the resources I've listed.

I have recently joined Amazon in their Affiliate program.  I'm looking forward to sharing products which I love and use in my art life and hope that you will consider using my links so I get credit.

Tripod for Photography

I just found this product on Amazon, it is a tripod which has a center bar which pulls out and places the camera horizontal to the table.  I think this is brilliant and think that I will try it for my online classes and tutorials.  I will post more once I have the tripod and have used it.  Take a look at the link and see what you think.

Calligraphy Journey

One of my goals for this year was to take a Calligraphy class, I'd like to eventually use calligraphy in conjunction with my artwork.  I'm certainly not there yet though.  I became interested in lettering a number of years ago, because I am a "can do" kind of person I just knew that I could teach myself Calligraphy.  As far as I can see about all that I taught myself was bad habits.  I didn't have any of the foundation work and didn't really see the point in making lettering which was the "right" size so would just practice my letters until I had a pretty letter.  I enjoyed myself but now have to break all of those bad habits.  It is certainly going to be a work in progress and can see that it is going to take time until I'm able to letter on any of my artwork using Calligraphy.

This was my first week practice, this is just the one that I kept to share with you.  I had quite a few sheets which went into the round file.  

Second week practice.  Some of the letters are getting better after hours of practice and many sheets going in the garbage.  

Third week practice, we worked on v's w's, z, and an angular y.  Much harder this week and I'm sure will throw away lots of pages.  

 I will keep you posted as to my progress, I have class on Tuesdays and if you follow me on Instagram I have tried to post samples before I throw them away.  I have a few more classes in this first session and then will take the second session as well.  Have you ever done any Calligraphy?

In person class

As many of you know I am a retired Art Teacher, taught in the public school system for 35 years and now can teach just a few students at a time which is such a privilege.  I recently taught a class to two wonderful ladies who just wanted to paint!  We Gelli printed, painted on canvases, added collage elements, stenciled and just had a wonderful time.  Look at their journey.

Want to take a class?  

Studio

Just cleaned my studio.  My husband wanted to know what I had cleaned.  .Oh well, you can't win them all.  I even cleaned off all of my shelved and reorganized and re-purposed things into the garbage.