Inspired by Lindisfarne project reaches half-way point

My calligraphy groups are half-way through their Inspired by Lindisfarne project.

Over the last five weeks, we have been working with guest artists Yvette Ja and Carrie Dennison to make books and create Celtic knots.

Each group has also enjoyed a trip to Newcastle to see the Lindisfarne Gospels exhibition at the Laing Art Gallery.

The project has been supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England.

Paper artist Yvette Ja spent six hours with each group, introducing them to bookbinding.

In the first session, we created the ‘signatures’ that form the pages of the book by folding and trimming A4 pages down to A6.

In the second session, we stitched the signatures together using Coptic stitch, in the same way the pages of the Lindisfarne Gospels would have been bound together.

In the third session, we created the cover of the book and attached the signatures.

Yvette brought such a gorgeous selection of papers from Cambridge Imprint, it was hard to choose which ones to use for the end papers and cover!    

Guest artists lend their skills to project

Artist Carrie Dennison introduced both groups to Celtic knotwork, specifically the patterns that were used in the Lindisfarne Gospels and can be clearly seen on the cover.

The ‘knots’ are formed around a grid system containing a number of circles and like calligraphy, there are various rules to follow.

Carrie has some workshops coming up, so I won’t share her secrets here!

We were all fascinated by the actual Lindisfarne Gospels exhibition. You can read all about it here.

Now that we have seen the manuscript, the second half of the project will be spent producing individual responses to it.

The aim is for everyone to create a piece of work for exhibition in the new year and we have three venues lined up.

Inspired by Lindisfarne will be on show at The Customs House in South Shields for six weeks from January 20, followed by 17Nineteen in Sunderland and South Shields Museum and Art Gallery.

Watch this space for more updates!