The Joy of Movement (Ewan Clayton: 5 day)

Skill Level: All

Push, float, glide, dab. We all love to move, and in movement lies one of the pleasures of calligraphy. Fluent styles of movement characterize good letterforms, extend our creativity and encourage the emergence of personal expression. In this weeklong workshop we will experiment, in a structured way, with different movement styles. Letters and marks that push, float, glide, flutter and much else. Just as singers exercise their voices to expand their range of notes and tones so we will exercise our pens on the paper. Working at first with abstract pattern and lines we apply these movements to different styles of letterforms, overcoming limited and habitual patterns of movement in the process. You will emerge from this class with a new confidence in your own ability to write and to create personal styles of calligraphy – and with the work to prove it.

Supply List: Layout Bond (11×17, 50 sheets); black non-waterproof ink; water container; your usual calligraphy tools; automatic pens and any other unusual writing tools you have; some gouache and a mixing brush; wiping cloth.

About the instructor: Ewan Clayton lives in Brighton, UK, where he runs his own calligraphy studio. He is Professor in Design at the University of Sunderland. In 2009 he established the university’s new Foundation Degree in Calligraphy with Design, which runs from the Kensington Palace Studios of the Prince of Wales’ Drawing School, London. For sixteen years Ewan worked as a consultant to the Xerox Palo Alto Research Centre (PARC), the lab that invented the personal computer, with an interest in highlighting quality of life issues and the need for contemplative spaces in all areas of life.  Growing up near Ditchling, Sussex, he and two earlier generations of his family worked in a guild of craftsmen founded by Eric Gill. Ewan has exhibited work widely in the UK, Europe, North America, and Asia. He has also curated seminal exhibitions on the calligrapher Edward Johnston; the poet David Jones; the relationship between calligraphy and Digital type; and Handwriting – everyone’s art.