Thomas Ingmire

Thomas ingmire is one of the forerunners of the modern western calligraphy movement in the world today. Focused on the exploration of calligraphy as fine arts medium.

He has exhibited widely.


The uniqueness of Thomas Ingmire’s art work lies in its relationship to the traditions of calligraphy. Testimony to his talent as a craftsman was his election in 1977 to the English Society of Scribes and Illuminators. Ingmire was the first American and first person outside of the United Kingdom to receive this honor.

Ingmire has also been an important teacher in the world calligraphy community. He has taught since l978 and has conducted workshops throughout the United States, Canada, Australia, and several countries in Europe as well as in Japan and Hong Kong.

Alchimie du Verbe (1988)

 Loading Mercury with a Pitchfork (1999)

Collaborations with Joseph Goldstein.
  

PASSION PLACE (l997)

RHYTHMS SERIES 1 (1997)

THE EDGE OF LIGHT (1998)

English Calligraphy

Old English Calligraphy history is by far an intriguing story

The Roman alphabets is the alphabet used for the English language. In the history of Old English writing Calligraphy, its alphabets origons goes way back to pictography. Pictography is believed to have been the first writing system. Pictography, is drawning simple pictures that represent images of real life object or beings.

 

The phonic alphabets is developed from pictography. The phonic alphabet influenced the Greek alphabet, then the Romans developed there alphabets from the Greek alphabet, which is used in the English writing system till this day. Since then there has been many developments and improvements to the Roman alphabets system, and it evolved over time in visual form and legibility as well as techniques and materials used.
The Greek alphabets were developed using phonic alphabets in around 2500BC. Not so directly was the Roman alphabet learnt from the Greek alphabet but learnt from the Etruscans who learned from the Greeks alphabet.
The Roman alphabet In the first century AD had the alphabet letters j, v and w added.
During the end of the Roman empire the Papyrus scroll was replaced by the codex books.

 

In the fourth century AD the Romans developed a script called the 'uncials script'. This developed and aloud for a new script influenced by the 'uncials script'(3rd to 7th century) called the 'half-uncials script'(3rd to 9th century) This script was a cursive styled script and there was developments from the ascenders and descenders of this script from the last 'uncials script'.

Roman Origins = pictography to phonic alphabet to Etruscans alphabet to Greek alphabet to the Roman alphabet.
Some other type of letter scripts used in old English calligraphy was the Gothic and Medieval calligraphy. Gothic calligraphy is also known as black letters. They are a sans serif script of the middle ages which originated from the British Northan France. Gothic script was heavily used during 11 to 16th century Britain. The medieval calligraphy was used in Britain mainly during the periods.

English calligraphers to look at: Edward Johnson, Ken Brown, Peter Bales, Hermann Zapf, Zapf Chancery, Neil Macmillan, Robin Dodd, Quentin Crisp and Humphrey Lyttelton.

Japanese Calligraphy

Japanese Calligraphy is as intriguing as the Japanese Culture itself. It originated in China and goes back to around 28 BC. It came to Japan when Chinese culture was becoming more widespread, which was in the periods of Asoka (552-646) and Nara (646-794).

History of Japanese Calligraphy

The 'Kara Yo' calligraphy style, derived from the Chinese calligraphy's use of structure, in there following of strict axes and symmetrical rules. 'Kara Yo' started from around the Kamakura period, which was from 1192 to 1333. Little is known of the history of Japaneses calligraphy within this style.
'Kana' is a Japanese style developed by Chinese calligraphy. The characters in this calligraphy style expresses sound not ideographic, unlike most of the other Asian and Chinese calligraphy styles. The sub-styles used in the 'Kana' calligraphy are; Man'yo-gana, Hiragana and Katakana. Also there are distinctive styles that are common for men and women. The men's hand writing style is known as 'katakana' and 'kenji' whereas the women's handwriting style is known to be 'onokode' and 'so'( grass writing).
The Styles of writing within Japanese calligraphy are; Tensho 'The Seal Script', Reisho 'The Scribe script', Zattaisho 'The ornamental Script', Gyosho 'The Semi cursive Script' and Shosho 'The Cursive Script', Hiragana ordinary syllabic script and the 'Wayo Style' Kara yo 'the Japanese architectural style'. As time went on and as Japanese culture rose, the Japaneses developed there own calligraphy style and writing system called 'Wayo'. This style implemented the 8 basic strokes that would be used in Japanese calligraphy. The strokes are sharper than the Chinese characters.
Calligraphy is known as 'shodo' in Japan which means 'the way of writing'. The Japanese now have 2 main calligraphy styles called 'kana' and 'kanji'.

• Kaisho Kaisho literally means “correct writing”. In other words, this is the style in which each of the strokes is made in a deliberate and clear way, creating a form that is very similar to the printed version of the character that one might see in a newspaper.
  This is the form that students of calligraphy study first, since it is close to the everyday written characters they are already familiar with, but at the same time it gives them the opportunity to get used to using the brush (fude) correctly.
  Below you can see the character for “dream” written in kaisho style on the left, and on the right as written using a word processor. Notice how similar they are in form.
  
• Gyousho Gyousho literally means “traveling writing” and refers to the semi-cursive style of Japanese calligraphy. Like cursive handwriting in English, this is the style that most people will usually use to write with when taking notes. Furthermore, as with English cursive style, what are written as separate strokes in kaisho style flow together to form a more rounded whole in gyousho. Text written in this style is can usually be read by the majority of educated Japanese.
  The same character is written in gyousho below with the printed version for comparison once more. Notice how it is more flowing and artistic.
  
• Sousho Sousho means “grass writing” and refers to the flowing cursive style of calligraphy. Here, form supersedes readability as the calligraphy artist rarely allows her brush to leave the paper, resulting in a graceful, swooping shapes. Only those trained in shodou are usually able to read this type of script.
  Notice how the shape of the character is now almost completely unrecognizable as the same kanji in print on the right. It is now more a stylized work of art than a vehicle for conveying information.
   

Korean calligraphy

Korean calligraphy, is seen as a pure art form in the Korean culture, and other Asian cultures.
It is one of Korea’s most loved art forms. The calligrapher’s brush strokes flows, and dances, across surfaces producing beautiful letter forms. The subject matter of the calligraphy and personality of the calligrapher combines in the letterforms.

 

The Korean alphabets were created as early as 1447. Despite the Koreans having their own alphabets, they were using Chinese alphabets for their official script up until the 19th century.
A person looking at East Asian calligraphy for the first time might find it hard to tell the differences between Korean and other Asian calligraphy types. But when you have recognised and learnt the basics of each Eastern Asian calligraphy type, you will instantly know the differences between them.

 

Modern calligraphy in Korea is trying to steer away from other calligraphy types especially Chinese and create an unique identity of its own.

Islamic Calligraphy

Islamic calligraphy is the beautiful writing of the Arabic script. It is has been the main Islamic art since the Quran's revelation 610 AD. It has helped and continues to help preserve the beautiful words of the Quran. The Muslim scribes of the time recorded the Quranic text and many of the Muslim's memoriesed it. Images of living beings are not aloud to be drawn in Islam so the text is very precious.

The Nabatean script was the recorded earliest form of pre-Arabic script. The early Arabs, called the Nabatean's, are said to have developed the Aramaic script, also known as the north Arabic script, during around the 5th century. It became very popular and swept to the rest of the ancient middle east in around 9 BCE. Ammonite and Aramaic were languages that used the Aramaic script.
As the Aramaic language and writing evolved, the Arabic script took over and started from around 500AD, which was the first recorded Arabic alphabet. There are around roughly 20 languages all spoken today that writes in the Arabic script. As the time went on, the Aramaic dictionary was developing leading to the Arabic alphabet, evolving and becoming the most widespread writing system worldwide.
There are many types of cursive scripts used in Islamic calligraphy one being; The kufic script also known as the Kufi script. This scrip became popular in the 10th century

 

Some other Cursive scrips are

• Diwani  16th century
• Req'aa and Tawqi 9th century
• Naskh 10th century, popular calligraphy style with most of Quran written with this calligraphy script style Computers typically use Naskh or a Naskh-like script, for instance: بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم
• Thuluth 11th centur

 

Chinese Calligraphy

Ancient Chinese Calligraphy has always been considered one of the purest art forms.The Chinese language is monosyllabic which means that each character written represents a word of an object or living form.
The earliest form of Chinese writing, dates back to 28th century BC. There are many myths but no solid facts as to what Chinese writing prior this time was actually like. Chinese writing has changed in styles, from the beginning of writing till this day. In China and other East Asian countries, writing is said to have been invented by 'Fu Hsi'. It was developed by two signs called 'ying' and 'yang, which represented positive and negative. The ying drawn was simple one line and the yang was a line with a gap in the middle.

Pictograms began from 2697 to 2596 BC. The Chinese character calligraphy styles developed from Pictorial pictograms to; shell and bone, chin wen, stone drum, chu chien, seal style, li, chang tsao, kai, hsing and tao.

Calligraphy

The word 'calligraphy' is derived from the Greek words 'killi' and 'graphos', meaning 'beautiful and 'writing'.
calligraphers strive to express harmony and emotion through the forms of letters. Even if you do not understand the actual translation of the calligraphic word, you are instantly drawn to the beautiful art of the letter forms. This is why calligraphy is known as 'beautiful writing'.

To study the historical context of calligraphy, is to study the origins and developments of calligraphy during its ages. You must know where you've come from to know where you are going. So lets start from the begining.