IRAN ART EXHIBITION: WHAT IS CALLIGRAPHY ART?
Learn the Art of Calligraphy
The term calligraphy comes from the Greek ‘Kallos’ meaning beauty and ‘Graphein’ which means to write. The history of calligraphy dates back thousands of years, but until a few hundred years ago, there was no clear term for the elaborate decorative form of handwriting. With the invention of printing in the mid 15th century however, a distinction began to be made between basic handwriting and the artistic forms of scripts and lettering. The word “calligraphy” did not appear in the English language until 1613. Earn your calligraphy badge to learn more about this fascinating art form. Badges that can be earned alongside include topics such as the Card Making badge, Drawing Badge, Painting Badge or Historic Era badge.
What is Calligraphy?
So what classifies something as calligraphy? According to the dictionary, the definition is any decorative handwriting or handwritten lettering created with a pen or brush.
Hand Lettering vs Calligraphy
IRAN ART EXHIBITION: There is some debate over whether the art of hand lettering should be classified as Calligraphy. While in technical terms, hand lettering fits the definition of calligraphy, as it is a form of decorative letting, it is not made using specific strokes of a pen or brush. Instead, hand lettering treats each individual letter more as a piece of art, made up of many lines, colors and shading.
Calligraphy Terms
If you plan to get into more advanced forms of calligraphy a clear understanding of the terms used is essential.
Font Styles
A font is collection of characters with a similar design. These characters include lowercase and uppercase letters, numbers, punctuation marks, and symbols that are all created using the same style of upstrokes, downstrokes and flourishes.
IRAN ART EXHIBITION: Fonts are usually divided into three main categories: serif, sans serif and cursive. A serif is a small decorative line or stroke regularly attached to the end of a larger stroke in a letter or symbol within a particular font. Fonts without these small additional lines are called sans serif as “sans” means “without”. Cursive describes any writing style where the letters in each word are joined.
Brush Lettering
Brush lettering is a form of calligraphy that uses brush strokes to get thick and thin lines within letters to give them an artistic feel. The side of the brush is usually used on the down stroke to create thick lines, switching to the point of the brush on the upstroke to create the thin lines.
Timothy R. Botts – Calligrapher
Calligraphy itself is considered an art form, but many calligraphers take it a step further, combining lettering art with imagery, colors, and symbolism to create a single cohesive art piece.
One of my favorite artists is Timothy Botts, a calligrapher. He is known for transforming Bible verses into beautiful pieces of artwork. I own many of his books and they never cease to bring me joy.
IRAN ART EXHIBITION: In his biography, Tim quotes, “Historically, the tradition of calligraphy has been to celebrate the text by embellishing it. In addition to that worthy goal, I seek to portray the words so that the meaning is expressed visually – what I call word pictures. I make use of the principles of graphic design to aid in this communication – color, style, contrast, depth, symbolism and movement – to name a few.”
