The elegant simplicity of a "cola" pen

On one of the last days of the Gesture and Flow exhibition, artist Carol Ann Waugh stopped in to see the show and handed me an envelope. Inside was a “cola” pen that she’d made. It was so playful looking that I had trouble believing that it would actually function well. But after experimenting with it, I’m totally enchanted by its simplicity and line quality!

Handmade cola pen experiments.

Apparently lots of calligraphers work with these — a quick online search reveals that there are all kinds of video tutorials about how to make them from aluminum can material. People are using everything from coffee stirrers to bamboo to old paintbrushes as handles.

I was especially intrigued by @tinlunstudio’s video that modifies the original design to allow for “aggressive” linework with more splatter. My interest in mark-making continues so that nib variation is next on my list to make.

Here are some of my first experimental cola pen squiggles using Noodler’s Ink Eternal Polar Blue color on watercolor paper.

Markmaking influences / part 2

More about the impetus behind the pieces in my “Gesture and Flow” exhibition (May/June 2023)...

You may've read in the previous post about how, during the pandemic, I used drawing to alter potential collage imagery. In the spring of 2022 I participated in a Poetry and Collage residency. While learning about asemic writing, I began exploring all kinds of mark-making.

My husband and I were fortunate to be able to spend significant time on the Oregon Coast that year. I used my beach walks to gather potential mark-making tools: stems of dune grasses, sticks, driftwood, shell fragments, etc. Connecting to nature was an impetus in attempting to use these "finds" as tools. I worked on paper so that the pieces would be easy to move back and forth to the studio in Denver.

Natural tools: driftwood, sticks, and grasses — before they were darkened with ink

My favorite markmaking tools were the spiral structures from broken shells. They hold a pretty good quantity of ink and make lovely, blob-ular strokes that fade off into feathery wisps. There's a lot of chance and variation involved in how the ink flows and I enjoy working with that dynamic. Found papers, found words, found tools just seem to go together.

Marks made with the interior spiral structure of a found broken seashell.

During the residency, I used a page of asemic writing, made with the end of a stick as my pen, to support a few words of almost-hidden text. All the found words are tucked in to the right side so that they’re barely noticeable. It takes some study to discover the message. It reads: 

shadow 
evening wraps me, steady
How slowly dark
comes
down
be still

“Shadow,” asemic writing created with driftwood tool and ink with added collage poetry, 14 x 11”, 2022.

Over the last year, I've made marks on stacks of 14 x 11" watercolor papers. Some of the resulting designs were intriguing enough that I decided to add collage elements to emphasize the curving shapes, extend the lines, and punctuate the movement. It was a joy to discover paper elements that contained imagery (lines and curves) that matched up with the linework or otherwise enhanced the composition. Responding to the marks (and learning when to stop) was an engaging and time-consuming process. I worked on several at a time so that when I got “stuck”, I could work on another. Somehow the appropriate imagery would eventually be found and I could then return to add the needed element(s). And the back and forth cycle of developing the final works would continue.

“Pivot,” collage and ink on watercolor paper, 14 x 11”, 2023.

“Buoyancy,” collage and ink on watercolor paper, 14 x 11”, 2023.

The resulting collages make up the bulk of the work in the Gesture and Flow exhibition. They are very different from anything I've created in the past. I'm learning a lot by talking about the collages with people who visit the show. I’m getting feedback about their being quite joyous and especially captivating upon close inspection. I loved hearing a couple of people reference Calder’s work while looking at them, a correlation that hadn’t occurred to me, although I’ve always resonated with his works. (And have a Calder-esque mobile over my desk!)

Hanging the work on the gallery walls allows me to gain further perspective by studying the pieces as a related group — I think this work will form the basis for an ongoing series of collages.

Gallery installation of Gesture and Flow exhibition, 2023. Each collage is framed, 20 x 16”, and was made in 2022-23.

This concept may work best on an intimate scale, but I'd also like to try working on larger versions. Perhaps by working with bigger brushes or tools and responding with appropriately-sized collage elements. Another option is to continue to work with the current tools by scanning and enlarging the marks, printing them out, and then adding larger collage elements. Not sure where all this is going but I'm enjoying the process!

Markmaking influences / how I got here

The pieces in my upcoming “Gesture and Flow” exhibition (May/June 2023) make my interest in line and type more apparent than in any body of work I’ve produced before. The backstory that got me here seems worthy of exploring.

As a graphic design student at Oregon State University, an incredibly thorough understanding of typography was demanded. This was pre-computer so we were drawing letterforms and roughing in text blocks by hand for our projects. The curriculum also included a full year of calligraphy courses (thank you, Allen Wong). By senior year we were able to access and incorporate rub-on (Letraset) type. We also learned how to mark up text and specify typesetting so it could be ordered from actual typographers.

As a senior, I had an internship in the campus Office of Publications under the amazing mentorship of Marilyn Holsinger (both an ace designer and a talented calligrapher).

Shown here is the outside spread from one of my first projects under Marilyn’s influence. It incorporates wave forms that I designed, then carefully inked by hand onto mylar.

Brochure spread measures 11 x 11”, folds to 5.5” x 11”, circa 1978 (!)

Although most of the University’s materials were photo-typeset, the class catalog (about the size of a phonebook) was still being set with hot metal on Linotype machines which made a distinctive and impressive racket. It was amazing to witness the whirlwind of change that eventually ushered in digital typesetting. The campus print shop had a full range of printing equipment too.

I consider it a gift to have seen all of the processes and machinery in action. I learned so much about the evolution of typesetting and printing practices from a hands-on perspective. (During the internship Marilyn also used me as an occasional model for campus promotional materials — that’s me back in the day.)

This background always informed my design work and 40+ year career. I occasionally developed gestural calligraphic and strongly-lined woodblock illustrations to use in client projects. And all the while, I was also pursuing my interest in collage, at first in a limited way, but by the late 1990’s I was very focused on collage as a complement (and antidote) to my computer-based design work.

Hand-carved woodblock print made to illustrate a client brochure, approximately 10 x 8”, circa 2003.

When the Covid lock-downs began in 2020, while on extra-long Zoom calls, I began altering magazine photos with marks, patterns, and asemic writing. I have used fragments from some of those images in a few collages, like these, made in response to a call for art sponsored by the Doug + Laurie Kanyer Art Collection. I still have a big folder of patterned elements that may come into play in future collages.

Small collages, each just 1” square, using some elements that were altered with white ink, 2020

A small pile of my inked-upon collage elements. I usually make the marks while the imagery is still in the magazine, and them rip pieces out to get the shapes/bits I want for a project.

As you might imagine, there is more to the story of incorporating markmaking with collage — so this is the first of one (or a few?) more post/s to come.