Flourishes - May, 2006

Kaye’s Korner

Our opening reception at Los Patios on April 2  was a great success! The harp music by Past President Nancy Mc Hugh added a note of elegance.  We have 50 beautiful pieces hanging for the public to view.  The show will hang for 2 months.  Be sure and get by to see it and take some friends for lunch.  The grounds are beautiful.  The shops are fun to browse.  Our thanks to Sally Theus for suggesting Los Patios for our spring 30th Anniversary Show and for speaking to the owner.  Eleven members helped hang the show, led by Maggie Gillikin.  Our original 26 Letter pieces are on display and also the poster that was made from them.
 
Jill Adams, BJ Grant and Helen Rasplicka have chaired the committee this past year and made arrangements for the catering, invitation and poster, and registering the pieces as they were turned in by the members, and producing the beautiful program.  A big thanks to them for all their hard work.  A special presentation of 30 roses was made to Helen Rasplicka, our only charter member still active.
 
Our regular monthly meeting on April 6 was very special.  The nametags had attachments of bookmarks in different colors denoting the number of years of membership.  These were designed and constructed by Betty Lou Jordan and Lenora Jordan.  The door prizes were numerous and especially nice and were given out by Sylvia Stanley, starting with the longest guild membership.  Everyone received a door prize.
 
The refreshment table was beautifully set by Lynn Rothe who has such a talent for arranging beautiful flowers, and making everything lovely.  The food was provided by Nancy Meier, Lenora Jordan, Dolores Schultz and Mary Bumstead.
 
Bill Waddington's old friend "Johnny,"( a monk from Greenland), led guild members in fond memories of years past.  It was so interesting how some learned of the existence of the Calligraphy Guild.  The recalling of the many outstanding teachers who have been here the last 30 years was especially fun.  Camille Storment, historian, brought the scrapbooks for all to enjoy.    Sally Gooze, Okinawa, and Jennie McHugh Duncan, Kansas (charter member) sent greetings.  It was a memorable night.  
 
Our white tee shirts and aprons now have our logo on them thanks to Rudy Gonzalez.  They are just beautiful and I can't wait to wear mine.  Thank you Rudy for a beautiful job and for giving your profit to the guild.  
 
Our May meeting will be another one not to be missed as Maggie Gillikin presents a retrospective of her work and the winner of the Paul Freeman Award is announced.  What a great year this has been.
 
See you in May.
 
Cheers,

Kaye 

 

May Activities

Early Bird  
Maggie Gillikin: A Retrospective

Thursday, May 4, 2006, 6:30-9 PM

Maggie Gillikin has been a member of SACG for 15 years, and during that time the guild has been the benefactor of her very impressive skills as an artist and also of her infinite generosity. A signature member of the Southwest Watercolor Society, Maggie comes to calligraphy from painting and brings a painter’s approach to her work. And she had a life in education long before her life in the guild, and she is known to much of San Antonio as “The Puppet Lady” and as “The Book Lady.” We will be treated to an Early Bird display of Maggie’s work, as well as a slide show presentation of Maggie’s many accomplishments in the world of art.

Please join us for our annual retrospective as Maggie shares her life in the arts with us.


Mini Workshop 

HINGED SHADOWBOX BOOK with KAREN VENI

Thursday, May 18, 2006, 7-9 pm

It’ll be hard to stop playing with this delightful, versatile structure - a perfect Secret Pal gift!

* * *

Bring these supplies to make the shadowbox pages:

12” see through ruler (with 1/2” grid lines) if you have one; A metal ruler if you don’t .
Bone folder
Sharp pencil with eraser
White glue (PVA)
Glue rinse water container
1/4” - 1/2” glue brush
Scrap paper for glue sheets
Small sharp scissors
X-acto knife and small cutting mat
Rag or paper towels
A Score Board -if you have one
I’m giving you white card stock cut to size, and Japanese paper for the hinges. If you want to work with colored paper instead, bring: 
4 pieces cardstock, cut 4 1/2” x 7 1/2” (grain long)
A small amount of strong, flexible paper for hinges (a Japanese paper or a high cotton fiber content)
To decorate the shadowbox pages:

You don’t have to bring any of this. You might want to just relax and make a model of the structure. But if you’d like to play with design, you have choices to consider. What do you want to do in the roughly 3” windows of your shadowboxes?
Inset images? Bring small photos or photocopies (up to 3”)
Calligraph words? Bring favorite pens, ink, and paper
Cut out lettering? Lettering ideas, tracing or transfer paper
Draw a design? Bring pencils, markers, colored pencils
Punch shapes? Bring punches
Stamp design? Bring stamps, ink pads, cleaner
Create dimensional collage? Bring collages stuff, tape, glue, threads, etc.

 

bulletin board
WHAT A WONDERFUL WEEK!

On Sunday, April 2, we all enjoyed the opening of our 30th Anniversary Spring Exhibit at Los Patios. The show was beautiful, if we do say so ourselves! Los Patios provided a lovely setting in the Arbor Room for our 50 pieces of calligraphic art, and they provided us with delicious food and punch as well. Charter member Helen Rasplicka received a vase full of 30 flowers to mark our anniversary, and a good time was had by all. If you have not seen the show, you still have time. It will hang through May. And if you’ve already seen it, it’s even worth a second look.

Thank you again very much to Jill Adams, BJ Grant, and Helen Rasplicka for spearheading the exhibit arrangements this year. And thanks also to Maggie Gillikin for doing such a great job of hanging the exhibit, along with Jill, BJ, Helen, Pauline Sager, Beverly Carter, Camille Storment, Bill Waddington, Bill Bristow, and numerous others who assisted on turn-in day.

As if the exhibit weren’t enough fun, we held our 30th Anniversary Celebration meeting on Thursday, April 6. Lynne Rothe, Dolores Schultz, Nancy Meier, Mary Bumstead, and Lenora Jordan presented a lovely hospitality table. The Program was one of fond reminiscences, hosted by a very special Master of Ceremonies, Johnny the Monk, from a monastery in Greenland. Johnny bears an uncanny resemblance to our own Bill Waddington (who was unexpectedly called away). He arrived in full regalia, with brown hooded robe, belt rope, gilded beard, and shaved head. In his tale of “How Helen Met Johnny,” Johnny said he was from an abbey, which did give us pause. But he sent this explanation:

The “abbey” referred to was, in fact, a monastery. When her friend told her about the manuscripts, Johnny thought Helen would be hesitant to visit a monastery by herself in the Greenland wilderness, so he told her it was an abbey. Even though she was surrounded by monks upon her arrival, Helen threw caution to the wind when she was given permission to search for the manuscripts, so she convinced herself that she was in fact in an abbey. Besides, she had me to protect her!

Whatever you say, Johnny!

PAUL FREEMAN AWARDS

It is time for the annual presentation of the Paul Freeman Awards for outstanding service to the guild in the past year. We voted at the April meeting, and the awards will be presented in May. Each of the three winners will get to keep a special framed work of calligraphic art for the coming year. And every nominee will receive a surprise gift.

We would like to offer our sincere condolences to Carol Keith and to Jennifer Phillips, to each on the loss of her sister. Our thoughts are with you at this difficult time.

And we wish a speedy recovery to Mary Bumstead and Hanni Jane Thomas, both of whom have been ill in the past months.

2006-2007 SLATE OF OFFICERS

The Nominating Committee has finalized the proposed slate of officers for the coming year. Please note that there is a slight change from the slate announced at the last meeting, due to a change in the personal circumstances of two of the nominees. We will vote at the May meeting. We very much appreciate the willingness of these individuals to serve and hope that they will have the full support of the entire guild.

President Pam Thomas
Vice President Lynn Rothe
Secretary Becky Hughes 
Treasurer Jill Adams
Members at 
Large: Beverly Carter
Nancy Meier
Lenora Jordan
Camille Storment
Leslie Winakur


A NOTE TO SECRET PALS

You’ve given us your little metal book. You’ll get your pal’s book at the May meeting! This year’s design challenge will also be revealed.

Please contact Cheri Wolf if you can’t be there, so we can get your book to you.

 

May Birthdays
1 Mary Bowman
2 Leslie Winakur
3 Rudy Gonzalez
13 Joan Schmitz
15 Barbara Mitchell
17 Armida Gonzalez
18 Sally Gooze
24 Melanie Reese
24 Stephanie Sisley
30 Vera Irby

   

Our 30th Anniversary Celebration

 

A person can learn so much at a 30th Anniversary Celebration, like...


Helen Rasplicka used to have a motorcycle, learned calligraphy from Kitty Maguire, formed our guild with Jennie McHugh and helped to write the by-laws.

Rod Smith always wanted to make a book, saw Kitty Maguire’s book in a display and signed up for her class, then secretly practiced in the bathroom with the door locked, in order to surprise his wife with the book he’d made her.

Nancy McHugh is the mother of Jennie McHugh, who is a charter member who started doing calligraphy so that she could address her own wedding invitations.

Eleanor Russell was our first workshop chairperson and brought Paul Freeman here to teach our very first serious major workshop.

Vera Irby was told by a prominent calligraphy instructor that it was “ridiculous” to be left handed!

Pauline Sager came here in 1977 and was enrolled in a workshop within 6 weeks! 

Carol Patterson studied with Lloyd Reynolds, Friedrich Neugebauer, Hermann Zapf, and Sheila Waters, and she stood on the scaffolding and watched Father Catich chisel.

Dolores Schultz attended the very first international conference at St. John’s in Minnesota, and then came home and started the South West Calligraphy Conference.

Camille Storment took her first calligraphy class from Donald Jackson.

Rudy Gonzalez learned calligraphy when his boss brought him some ink, a Speedball pen, and 200 certificates and said, “Letter these, it’s just like sign painting only smaller, and by the way, don’t make any mistakes because we don’t have any spares.”

Bill Bristow, retired professor and chairman of the Department of Art at Trinity University, calls himself one of Joan Schmitz’s only failures as a calligraphy student and says the guild only keeps him on as a sort of pet mascot!

The Anniversary Celebration was just that - a celebration of friendship, a shared love of the calligraphic arts, and a shared history. Many of the members present that night stressed the sentiment that Sylvia Stanley expressed best when she said “the strength of our guild is its generosity and the friendliness of its members.” And many reminded us of the contributions of those who are no longer with us, either because they have moved on to other places and interests, or because sadly they have passed away. These include Martha Hicks, Grace Strey, Corinda Allison, Denise Adler, Kitty Maguire, Kit Nelson, and many others. We celebrated long into the night and enjoyed ourselves immensely. May we have many, many more celebrations like this one.

 

What membership in the SACG has meant to 
Bonnie Houser: 

Alphabets, Alphabetica, acrylics, aha
Brady, brushes, books, Brown, Beasley
Cookbook Committee, Culmone, collage, calendars, Cicale
Decorated letters, dirty fingers
Ezell, envelopes
Foundational, Furber, Fay
Gouache, gold, golden mean, Ghost Ranch
Hours of practice, Harris, hubby’s patience for my calligraphic indulgence
Ink, Ingmire, italic
Jackson, journals
Kiesel, Kesceg, Knight, Kells
Letterforms, 26 Letters, Linex, Legacies
Melvin, Morentz, Moore
Nibs, new sheet of paper
Opportunities, lost and taken
Paste paper, paint, Phillips, pastels, Patterson, Palleson

Quotes, quips, quills
Rasplicka, Reis, Reggie color wheel
Surface design, Strom, Spraher, St. John’s Bible
Threads, texture, tempered
Uncial
Valentines, vellum, versals, visible language
Workshops, Waters
Xyron
Yellow and blue don’t make green
Zoomorphic, zingers, Zeugin

 

The Art of Papercutting
SATURDAY SPECIAL
Saturday, August 5, 2006
10:00 AM - 4:00 PM

In the usual meeting place at Christ Episcopal Church
$20.00 (Members)  $25.00 (Non-Members)

Instructor:  Valerie Arcement

Valerie Arcement has been doing scherrenschnitte (papercutting), off 
and on for about 40 years.  She is a retired RN, Family Nurse 
Practitioner who has worked in NY, MA, KY, NM, TX and Mexico and is a 
member, and past President, of the Greater San Antonio Quilt Guild 
since 1983.  Valerie recently joined the Papercutters Guild of America 
and says she would would have joined earlier had she known they 
existed!  In the '60s she dabbled a bit in calligraphy herself but 
never pursued it as a hobby.

 Valerie has graciously said she would come to the May meeting and show 
members her work using examples from her portfolio and some framed 
pieces.  She will formulate the class according to what the 
participants would like to do as she has both purchased patterns as 
well as some she herself has designed.  Since quilting has been a long 
time hobby of hers, she has even developed some quilting designs using 
a paper-cutting technique. 

   Valerie will bring a supply list for interested participants to the May 
meeting.  A supply fee may be announced later and will be paid directly 
to the instructor.  Your class fee of $20.00 will ensure your place in 
this exciting class.  If you have any questions, please contact Betty 
Lou Jordan, Chairperson, at 654-4045. Checks may also be mailed to 
Betty Lou’s home: 12611 La Noche, San Antonio, TX 78233.

 May 2006 Flourishes' Web Page is proudly sponsored by
www.Renshirts.com in Seguin, TX USA

Web design by RIPTRON  

© 2006 San Antonio Calligraphy Guild (SACG)