Many apologies for not posting in a while. Real life took over, and I am a bit behind in scroll instruction that I started last month.
So I'll see if I can catch up with some items.
1. I did teaching painting with Eva at the Carolingian Scribal Guild last weekend. It was very lovely, Eva is a wonderful artist and teaching with her is a joy. People came away with some techniques and that was great. What I forgot to do was take pictures. I will remind myself for next time.
2. I am teaching painting tomorrow - if the snow that is coming down right now doesn't mess up my travel plans - at the Giggleswick Arts and Science event. Ah, right, remember to take pictures!
And lastly, a scroll of mine went out last weekend at Black Rose Ball. It was for a good friend, and this is that scrolls story!
So I'll see if I can catch up with some items.
1. I did teaching painting with Eva at the Carolingian Scribal Guild last weekend. It was very lovely, Eva is a wonderful artist and teaching with her is a joy. People came away with some techniques and that was great. What I forgot to do was take pictures. I will remind myself for next time.
2. I am teaching painting tomorrow - if the snow that is coming down right now doesn't mess up my travel plans - at the Giggleswick Arts and Science event. Ah, right, remember to take pictures!
And lastly, a scroll of mine went out last weekend at Black Rose Ball. It was for a good friend, and this is that scrolls story!
I have a dear friend Malcolm Bowman who was to receive his Pelican, the Society level service award for Service. I found out about it and only had four weeks to put this together from the time that the award was decided to when it would be given.
Okay, then. Let's get working.
I brainstormed with friends at an Uber Crafty at my good friends Elizabeth and Antonio's house in February. One suggested that the black hours would be a great subject. I have done quite a few lately, but I decided for this one I was going to go all out.
I started gathering the information that I needed which included a portrait of the recipient (I always find one, it helps with inspiration), some examples of black hours to chose from, the recipient's arms, the household arms of the two households that he is affiliated with - Sharc Pit and Toad, and posted those items to my mirror for contemplation and design.
Research information:
Okay, then. Let's get working.
I brainstormed with friends at an Uber Crafty at my good friends Elizabeth and Antonio's house in February. One suggested that the black hours would be a great subject. I have done quite a few lately, but I decided for this one I was going to go all out.
I started gathering the information that I needed which included a portrait of the recipient (I always find one, it helps with inspiration), some examples of black hours to chose from, the recipient's arms, the household arms of the two households that he is affiliated with - Sharc Pit and Toad, and posted those items to my mirror for contemplation and design.
Research information:
The Black Hours of Galeazzo Maria Sforza, 1466-76.
Malcolm's Arms
The digital facsimile of The Black Hours (MS M.493), a Book of Hours, 1470 created on vellum and stained or painted black
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Badges for Sharc Pit and Toad household
Assembling it all on my mirror in front of my art area for inspiration and easy access for reference.
A quick run to Michael's to get the right weight black paper for the job. I wanted to be able to feel the surface and the weight, and I needed this quick, so no ordering online. Time was of the essence. I purchased Arches black, medium weight and decided that I was going to do a two page layout, with the overall size of the art work being 27 inches by 39 inches. This was by far the largest art/scroll that I have done yet.
I started with the pencil sketches of the work , as you can see below, the Sharc Pit household badge, the Toad household badge, Malcolm's arms and the Pelican in its piety.
A quick run to Michael's to get the right weight black paper for the job. I wanted to be able to feel the surface and the weight, and I needed this quick, so no ordering online. Time was of the essence. I purchased Arches black, medium weight and decided that I was going to do a two page layout, with the overall size of the art work being 27 inches by 39 inches. This was by far the largest art/scroll that I have done yet.
I started with the pencil sketches of the work , as you can see below, the Sharc Pit household badge, the Toad household badge, Malcolm's arms and the Pelican in its piety.
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As you can see, the sketches are rough and do evolve over time. This often happens in my art, and I just am comfortable now with letting it happen.
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The gold leaf for the W. Artsy hint, always start with the gold leaf in your scrolls. I do outline inking, gold leaf, calligraphy, then painting, The nice thing about the black hours is that you don't need to outline inking.
Above right: The first couple of lines of text I did with the mosaic gold (see here for more on mosaic gold).
Above right: The first couple of lines of text I did with the mosaic gold (see here for more on mosaic gold).
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The next step was the calligraphy now. I used white gouache (either Windsor Newton or Holbein colors) watered down enough to use as ink to write the words. Getting the right mixture is hard so that the lettering is consistent, the right saturation, but still liquid enough to flow out of the pen. I also used the mosaic gold to highlight Malcolm's name and the Name of the Award.
The wonderful woman who made the words is Mistress Alys, and you can find the words here. Alys is a master with beautiful research for period wordings and it was an honor to put her words into a scroll. As you can see the gold leaf really shone in comparison to the other colors already, so that made me happy with how it was going to show up.
The next step was to start the painting. I try to go from light to dark, so I started with the larger elements of the painting, such as the Pelican, the arms, the badges and then worked my way to the darker elements of the leaves. First big painting area was the Pelican. I used the white gouache for the Pelican in its piety. I used practice pieces to make sure that I had the right look, and used several period pictures as references for A Pelican in Its Piety, complete with blood from the breast. The painting of the Pelican took hours to do, but I think it came out nicely.
Next step, work on the coat of arms for Malcolm.
The wonderful woman who made the words is Mistress Alys, and you can find the words here. Alys is a master with beautiful research for period wordings and it was an honor to put her words into a scroll. As you can see the gold leaf really shone in comparison to the other colors already, so that made me happy with how it was going to show up.
The next step was to start the painting. I try to go from light to dark, so I started with the larger elements of the painting, such as the Pelican, the arms, the badges and then worked my way to the darker elements of the leaves. First big painting area was the Pelican. I used the white gouache for the Pelican in its piety. I used practice pieces to make sure that I had the right look, and used several period pictures as references for A Pelican in Its Piety, complete with blood from the breast. The painting of the Pelican took hours to do, but I think it came out nicely.
Next step, work on the coat of arms for Malcolm.
I blocked it out with the colors that I was going to use and would return to it again later. I then went back and finished the Pelican piece of the artwork.
The next painting was the badges, again, starting with the white, and then moving to either the green or blue of the badge.
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I would have liked to have made the Toad Household badge more centered. I was much happier with the Sharc Pit badge.
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I returned to the achievement of arms for Malcolm. I liked the feathers for the crest, but would go back later to adjust the painting around the achievement. The picture on the right is as I begin to paint the leaves. I used silver (Windsor Newton), mosaic gold and raw ochre (period pigment) as my palette for the leaves. Normally I do one color at the time, but because of the way the leaves were pictured turning and twisting, it was important to have the colors inter-relate as well as space them out so that there was a flow for the eye. I didn't want any dead spots in the artwork or two much raw ochre in one spot and not enough white. So I was painting with all three colors at the same time.
Maddening. :-)
Maddening. :-)
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Progress photos of the leaves. I started on the right page first, working around the badges and the wording.
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The left hand side was started next and was around the Pelican in its piety and the achievement of arms. Apologies on the blurring of the photo to the left. In trying to move quickly with this scroll on four weeks to delivery, sometimes the picture taking suffered in order to keep plugging away. I believe at this point in the painting I realized that I didn't have another weekend to keep painting, but that it was due that very weekend.
At least eight hours later, almost all the leaves were painted. You can see that I changed the area around the achievement of arms, outlined it in silver and bulked up mantle.
This is where taking the pictures became important so that I could see dead spots or imperfections in the art. I realized after this picture that the corners were not square, so I had to add more leaves and detailing into the corners and into some of the "quieter" spots of the piece.
 More detail added. |  The Large initial W added with raw ochre. |
To the final product with all the final details.
And two closeups of the pages.
Things to keep in mind when doing Black Hour scrolls, the paint gets soaked up by the paper quickly. You need to work fast and have LOTS of paint ready and you will have to do layers of paint. It will take twice as long to paint as working on standard paper. The edges of the black paper were very fragile, so I reinforced the edges on the reverse side with painters tape. I did not get a picture of this, but if you imagine turning over the paper and putting tape in the same place you would put matting board down, and that reinforces the edges. Also when using the black paper, you need to think in reverse with regard to shadowing, as I did with the painting of the Pelican. The final thing is that you should test everything on a test sheet of black paper to see how your colors are going to look, react, and lay down.
The End. Fall down, go boom.
Things to keep in mind when doing Black Hour scrolls, the paint gets soaked up by the paper quickly. You need to work fast and have LOTS of paint ready and you will have to do layers of paint. It will take twice as long to paint as working on standard paper. The edges of the black paper were very fragile, so I reinforced the edges on the reverse side with painters tape. I did not get a picture of this, but if you imagine turning over the paper and putting tape in the same place you would put matting board down, and that reinforces the edges. Also when using the black paper, you need to think in reverse with regard to shadowing, as I did with the painting of the Pelican. The final thing is that you should test everything on a test sheet of black paper to see how your colors are going to look, react, and lay down.
The End. Fall down, go boom.
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