No. 34: Keeping a Lost Art Alive
How handwriting has played a dramatic role in my work throughout my career.
I have always been a very reluctant writer who loves to write words. I like the way my handwriting and hand-drawn words look, how they complete a page in my sketchbook, and I enjoy the process of playing around with all of the various ways I can push and pull my natural handwriting.
I use my handwriting and hand-drawn words in almost all of the work I create. Since my college years I have been experimenting with my handwriting so at this point you could call it a habit, a personal signature, and a way to fully express myself. Adding some writing after working on a piece explains to my future self why I chose to draw something. Plus I have a natural desire to write not only to keep track of time and memories, but also because stringing letterforms together is like a meditation.
In the sample below is work from when I was in college at Cooper Union—a series of one hundred small collage pieces that were hung to fill a wall. The handwriting was lifted from my diary. I enlarged the text using a photocopy machine and then tore it in pieces. I enlarged and tore just enough so that how the words read didn’t matter, as the idea was for them to be texture and form rather than to have meaning.
I am basically all over the place as far as how, where, and why I use my handwriting in my work. It’s everywhere, from my signature logo to client work. I have been hired to do so many things with my handwriting and lettering—logos, packaging, signage, book covers, editorial pieces, custom tattoos, personal stationery, and more. My handwriting was even made into a typeface by a client who wanted to be able to change words so frequently for an ongoing project that I couldn’t keep up with the demand.
Today, because most people see my art and writing in my sketch journal, I have become someone who coasts the worlds of journal keepers and artists alike.
Above are two examples of how my natural handwriting fills the spaces around the drawings. The date is drawn with more intention, but the small bundles of words on the page are used as a design element. I rarely reread what I have scribbled and am sometimes surprised when people comment on the “small print” after I share a sketchbook page on social media. It is generally not great writing and is filled with typos and misspelled words.
I find it interesting that my natural handwriting is quite messy. It’s somewhat uniform, and has an overall nice look, but when I write letters to friends, I sometimes have a hard time reading what I scribbled. I am always surprised at how impatient I am, trying to get the words down. The only way I can describe the difference is that when I write for purposes of communication, note-taking, and letter writing, I am using my messy, impatient handwriting. If I am in drawing mode then I naturally slow down and I am more conscious of the lines I’m making as I form letters and words. The words I draw are intended to be read, whereas the handwritten words are meant to blend into the background, to fill empty space.
Often people will ask me about my lettering style or my “calligraphy” style. Though I have been hired to address wedding invitations in the past, I don’t consider myself a calligrapher. When I think of calligraphy, I imagine letters that are consistent, perfectly balanced, and created in a specific way, with thicks and thins in the right places. I have memories of my calligraphy professor crituquing the accuracy of my copperplate letters and I could never quite get them right. I studied for only a semester or two because it was at that point when I decided that perfect letters were better left to the masters and for the computer to create.
By definition, calligraphy is decorative handwriting or handwritten lettering, so maybe I am a calligrapher?
I like to just say that I love to draw words as much as I love to draw everything else!
If you are a paid subscriber, make sure you check out Prompt No. 14: Drawing the Date for more on the topic and some inspiration for your sketchbook entries.
I would love to hear about your own relationship with your handwriting, and how and when it plays a role in your work. If you are a parent with kids who went to grade school in the past ten years, did they learn to write cursive?
Five Books That Inspire Creativity
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It completes the package :) I love looking at your journals and, more broadly, your work and seeing the world that you create as enhanced by your handwriting.
Now you’re talking...I love, love, love your writing about handwriting! I also have been playing with my handwriting since forever. Your examples are inspiring and beautiful. Though I’ve practiced “calligraphy hands” for years, I much prefer the freeer, looser thicks and thins of modern calligraphy...like your handwriting. I like the physical writing process and the feel of the pen or pencil on paper. It becomes meditative, and I can always tell what mood I’m in by the look of the letters on the page.
My neighbor’s mother made a living assessing people’s character from their handwriting...this was back in the 40’s/50s I think.
Completely self taught. I bet she would assess your character as sterling!
Thanks for this post...so timely.