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Contemporary Scripts: Lettering for the 21st Century with Mike Gold from American Greetings
Saturday & Sunday, August 18 & 19, 2007, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.
FREE Slide
Show Lecture Friday, August 17, from 7-9 p.m. at PCC Sylvania, CT 212
Maximum 20 students
Class Level: Beginner-Advanced
$100 PSC members, $125 non-members ($25 membership
included: please include a completed membership
form when submitting your
registration)
The class goal is to look beyond the traditional, formal calligraphic model to ways of lettering that are more appropriate in contemporary personal, commercial and fine art. The type of hand lettering being used by lettering artists today is very different from the kind of hand lettering done 500 years, 50 years, or even 5 years ago. The class plan is to provide some guiding design principles that will serve the artist in modifying or creating any new lettering for a particular job or piece of art. These principles will also provide a foundation to critique lettering and understand why it works and why it looks so fresh. We will look at how formal pointed and broad pen scripts like Italic and Roundhand as well as one's handwriting can provide a springboard for more contemporary scripts. We will consider freely drawn and built-up letterforms. We will practice with a variety of tools (pen & brush), writing surfaces and media. We will explore ways to create unique lettering styles that break many or all of the traditional rules, making it both personal and expressive.
Don’t miss this rare opportunity to experience a workshop with Mike Gold!
About Mike Gold: Mike has worked the last 15 years as a lettering artist at American Greetings. He has an M.A. in Visual Communications and 25 years' experience as a commercial artist. Mike has taught around the country and at two international conferences with his friend and collaborator Judy Melvin. Collaboration has been a feature of much of his personal work. Mike's work has been included in numerous Letter Arts Review annuals since 1991. Visit his
website: www.abbeygolddesign.comConfirmation and supply list will be sent upon acceptance into the workshop.
Mike Gold Workshop Review
One of the privileges of being a member of the Pittsburgh Calligraphy Guild is meeting extraordinary practitioners of a time honored art form. A recent workshop brought such a practitioner, Mike Gold from the American Greeting Card Company, to Pittsburgh for a two day tour de force.
As in any art form there is the formal aspect, the crafting of the letters. The calligrapher commonly works in alliance with the creator of statements by rendering the words with skill and grace to lend visual beauty to beautiful and meaningful words.
There is another aspect to the craft that elevates it to the level of Fine Art. Humans are beings with profound appetites, we crave satisfaction of all our five senses but most of all we need the expression and definition of emotions. Beauty satisfies the senses and the expression of feeling satisfies our inner being, our soul if you will, that we seek to define and by defining possibly refine to reach a deeper state of being. We usually think of music, images and sculptures as a vehicle through which we liberate and define our feelings and believes. We now must add calligraphy to the traditionally excepted forms of expression due to the redefinition of the nature of calligraphy by 20th century calligraphers.
Expression demands profound insight and the ability to allow what emerges from that inner depth to guide the hand and mind to make visual decisions. In any form of art that is the most difficult aspect in creating a tangible expression of an experience. Those who succeed we revere as masters of their respective form of expression.
It is a daunting task to guide those willing to follow to experience the liberating of sincere expressions, one such brave man, Mike Gold, came to Pittsburgh and guided those who participated in his workshop with patience, kindness and generosity that is only possible from those who have in thought and deed reached deeply within and touched the sublime aspect of the self. Frustration and exhilaration helped those he guided to hone understanding of the potential of infusing calligraphy with a power that transcends mere skill.
~by Flavia