March 2020 Dear Friends, photos and read more about the Number 138 At the top of many people’s retreat, see Page 4. FOC Council Members minds right now is news and Take care of yourselves, wash concern about the COVID-19 your hands, don’t touch your President virus and how it will affect face, live long and flourish. Evelyn Eldridge their daily lives. For Friends of XXX OOO, Vice President Calligraphy, this means being Evelyn Trivial Pursuit XXXII Elena Caruthers aware of changes that we might FOC Members gathered with need to make in canceling or six teachers and the coordinator, Treasurer rescheduling upcoming classes, Marcia Friedman for a wonderul Dean Robino workshops, and meetings. For day of learning, creating and example, the San Francisco Secretary sharing. Dorothy Yuki's Fredi Juni Public Library has canceled daughter Mia dazzled attendees all public meetings in their with a delicious lunch. Council Members facilities for the next few weeks, Martha Boccalini and consequently, FOC has Cynthia Cravens had to cancel the first of our Darla Engelmann new monthly series, Saturday Katie Leavens Scribes. FOC will notify you by Raoul Martinez email if we need to cancel or reschedule other events. Alphabet Editor A much more pleasant topic Carl Rohrs is the calligraphic fun times Clockwise: Debby Turrietta surveying the that FOC members have been lovely lunch offerings; Susan Ito showing �Bulletin Editor having so far in 2020. The Dorothy Yuki her techniques; the teachers: Nancy Noble thirty-second annual Trivial L to R: Virginia LeRoux; Caryn Lum, Sherrie Lovler; Marcia Friedman, Melissa Pursuits started the new year Titone, Susan Ito and Debra Ferreboeuf; with a day filled with six fifty- Melissa Titone demonstrating the letters she minute workshops, what I call introduced in her session. “speed dating for calligraphers". We played, laughed, ate, and completely enjoyed ourselves. Thanks to Marcia Friedman for organizing, Cynthia Cravens for managing the goody bags, and to the many other volunteers who helped during the day Denise Lach’s imaginative visual approach to calligraphy has long been an inspiration to artists and calligraphers. FOC was able to have Denise teach a workshop in February, which you can read about on Page 2. Letter from the President the from Letter Every year FOC members can attend a five-day retreat at Santa Sabina in San Rafael, where they relax, refresh, and focus on anything or nothing. To see Play on Writing/Writing Textures By: Caryn Lum we used that piece as the basis workshop in French. Denise for another piece in which we emphasized how important cut away paper, again trying to reflection on each result was. keep our positive and negative She said that her finished spaces optically balanced. One works often require multiple of my favorite exercises involved experiments with reflection filling a square with our text, upon each. The small format she rotating the paper by 90 degrees had us use also allows quick and layering the same text on completion of an experiment— top of the first, then repeating she recommended always two more times. It was an easy finishing an experiment, even if I had the amazing good way to create texture and one one is unhappy with the result fortune to attend Denise Lach’s can choose the density of the while it’s being created. Denise workshop Play on Writing/ piece by choosing the number explained that it’s necessary Writing Textures, having been of layers. Denise introduced a to reflect on a fully completed third on a waiting list of ten. couple of special mark-making piece, just as one might need Denise taught us how to play tools—hardwood pieces that to hear a musical composition with letterforms to create had been sanded to have both a in its entirety to understand it. decorative textures which relatively thick edge and a thin I jotted quick notes reacting to would become part of our edge and glass Pasteur transfer the relationships of curves to graphic vocabulary. For the straight lines, thicks and thins, bulk of the workshop she asked rhythm, density and space and us to work in the same 5- ½ inch whether broken borders worked square format with the same or not—and I came to realize short text, which allowed us to how valuable this practice concentrate on the textures that was, regardless of what artistic developed with each exercise. medium one might be working We started by filling our square in. Finally, our workshop with our short text in our usual coordinator, Dena, said that handwriting spaced fairly we owed Denise a big Merci for uniformly. For the next exercise agreeing to have more students she asked us to continue with in our workshop than she our usual handwriting, but normally has, so Merci beaucoup, make the letterforms two to Denise—from the last person three times bigger and reflect pipettes. Although not strictly to get into your incredible on what happened when we did texture making, she explained her workshop. so; in my case, I discovered that process for drawing inspiration by keeping my writing legible from nature photographs: with space between lines, I had making rough sketches to get made the texture and rhythm a sense of where the darks and less interesting. Starting with lights are and choosing tools, exercise three we were asked letterforms and text that match to leave no space between the image. Although there words or lines and to keep may be an infinite number our text as optically balanced of ways to create textures by as possible. In subsequent playing with text in the ways exercises we made conscious she showed us, Denise also said Denise Lach Workshop efforts to change the angle that it’s very important to her Denise's demo of texture making. or width of our letterforms, that the underlying text means to experiment with different something to her personally, tools and to create focal areas even if it’s not legible. She of increased density by filling shared many inspiring examples in spaces or adding color. An from her sketchbooks and exercise keeping positive and online one can find many more negative space balanced while illustrations of her process by using a broad edged tool was doing a Google image search remarkably difficult for me, but for Denise Lach workshop or I was pleasantly surprised when Denise Lach stage—stage = March 2020 2 Clockwise from top left: Denise sharing techniques from her book; Joe Boissy with a table full of excellent work; Sherrie Lovler working on her piece that is shown completed below; Vicky Lee proud of her cut-out letters; pipette demo without lifting the tip; Claudia Kruse's very creative final piece; Dorothy Yuki holding her 'cut-out letters' over her back; example of lettering and tools. The three examples under the group photo: left to right: Cut letter example; Dean Robino's piece and Meredith Klein's work with pipette. The participants in Denise Lach's: Play on Writing gather on the steps outside the work- shop on an our unseasonably warm February day. The lovely Denise is in the front row, center, wearing the red scarf. 3 Friends of Calligraphy 2020 FOC Spring Retreat By: Meredith Klein We were 30 this year, a mixture of: people who’ve been coming nearly every year, four new people, one person whose last retreat was in 1994, one who had to leave on Friday because her sons made it into a state robotics tournament, some folks who traveled from Arizona, Ohio and Massachusetts, and a very large stuffed duck named Francesco who occupied Mary Ann Wight's pieces that she completed a prominent spot next to A. at retreat. Her late nights definitley paid off! Blackman. There was warmth, sunshine, chilly days and a little rain. There was sharing of techniques: Altered Book, Lark’s Head Bound Book, Byopia Above: Alan's alphabet he worked on. Press Belt, Denise Lach Texture Below: Vicky Lee's work.. Exercises, tools, advice, stencils, paper and anything anyone needed. And a presentation of collaborative artist books. Above: Gorgeous work produced over the There was laughter. There five day retreat by Jacqueline Sullivan. was frequent hand washing Below: one of the many beautiful pieces and hugs given without using completed by Christi Payne. hands. There was a paste paper and gelli plate session, and in the paper room, black denim was available in addition to the usual abaca and kozo. The meals were delicious and wonderful. Friday morning, the scriptorium was aglow with the soft light of electric candles in handmade lanterns. There were Above: The special setting of Santa Sabina: walks and gentle yoga sessions. excellent gardens, walking trails, nature and a hermitage. Below: the calligraphic sign And there was, on Sunday, a that greets us as we enter our special place. collection of work done during retreat that took our breath away. At the end, we told each other, “can’t wait till next year!” The 2021 Retreat is March 3–7. Mark your calendars. Left: The Scriptorium at 6 AM Friday morning after Vicky Lee placed her beautiful FOC Spring Retreat 2020 Retreat Spring FOC 'lanterns' at each table—what a cherished gift. Right: Alan Blackman sneaking a quick afternoon nap while his table mate Francesco continued to work on his calligraphy . March 2020 4 Gudrun Zapf Toshimi Bill von Hesse Kumagai Gudrun passed away on In January, I learned that study group for many years December 13, 2019, at the age FOC member Toshimi Bill and willing to share his home of 101.