Following up on my post of May 2, which showed images of the binding of an illuminated manuscript I recently produced, in this post you can view a slideshow of some of the illumination work (gold leaf decorations) in the book.
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In this, and 2 or 3 following posts, I’ll be presenting images of some notable details of an illuminated manuscript I produced of the opening scenes of a long narrative poem I recently completed, entitled The Atternen Juez Talen (The Eternal Jew’s Tale).
I began working on this manuscript over a year ago, using a pre-bound empty book that had been given to me as a gift by my wife Nancy some number of years ago. The paper appears to be a Nepalese tissue with minimal sizing (“size” is a technical term that means ‘surface sealant’; unsized paper will allow ink to feather, therefore making it unsuitable for most calligraphy). Thus, I had to size each sheet. I used a thinned acrylic medium as my size. If you’re curious about my decision to use acrylic, contact me.
The sizing process was complicated for 3 reasons:
1. wetting the sheets meant they would become buckled and wrinkled upon drying;
2. since sizing is glue of one sort or another, it meant that if I put the pages in a press to avoid buckling, they would stick together into a solid block; and
3. since the book was already bound, pressing each sheet individually would have been prohibitively time consuming.
I’ll spare you the details of my solution, but needless to say, for this 156 sheet book it required over 2 months to complete the sizing project. But the result was quite nice. The acrylic size made the sheets somewhat pearlescent and translucent, which I liked a lot. But it meant I could only write on one side of each sheet. So suddenly, my 312 page book (156 sheets, both sides) became a 156 page book. No worries. It kept me plenty busy for another 10 months.
The production process was rather straight forward. First I did the calligraphy, using India ink. Then, using water colors, I painted small portraits on pages where the right margin of the text was wide enough to allow a miniature. Then I illuminated all the section breaks with various versions of a sunburst. There were about 20 of these illuminations. After that, I did a number of full and half-page illustrations, again using water colors. Finally, I bound the book in blue leather. Since I used a chrome-based tanned leather, it wouldn’t take gold tooling, so I painted the title on the front and spine, using acrylic paint.
In this post I’ll present images of the binding, the title page, and the end papers.
Enjoy!
One of the great museums in Turkiye is the Turk ve Islam, featuring Turkish and Islamic arts. Below you can view a slideshow of some of my favorite exhibits, primarily manuscripts, plus some carpets. Enjoy.
Some months ago I began a project to produce an illuminated manuscript of the poetry version of the Atternen Juez Talen. A prose, standard English version is being published in a weekly episodic format at the Times of Israel [https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/author/stephen-berer/], but the original poetry version remains largely inaccessible to the public. It seems the world is not yet ready for my visionary talen.
Therefore, I decided to produce an enduring and perhaps even elegant version as a stand-alone work of art. When completed, this illuminated manuscript will still only be about 1/3 to 1/4 of the whole poem, but I hope to illuminate the rest of the poem in further volumes. God Willing.
Below you can see page 103, which I penned today.
Calligraphic version, yet to be illuminated and illustrated
For the last 7 months I’ve been working on producing an amulet for my grandson, Jonah. It involved creating the design, laying the gold, painting the image, and calligraphing an inscription. The primary materials were calfskin parchment, gold leaf, acrylic paint, and ink. The whole project took 95 hours. Here’s a 3 minute video compiled from the photos I took as my work progressed. As you will see, progress was not always straightforward and satisfactory, but I’m very pleased with the results.
This 16 second video shows the development of an illumination for the Megillat Esther Josh and I are producing. Here’s the text of the video’s voice-over:
This illumination is based on a golden drinking vessel from the Achaemenid period. Conceivably, Xerxes, Achashverosh, could have used this vessel during the festivities described in the Book of Esther. I produced the image using gold leaf and water color.
Josh and I began work on the Megillah in early January, 2017. Since then I’ve kept a fairly careful log of my illumination work. Last week I crossed the 500 hour mark at about the same time as completing my 20th illumination. Here’s a group portrait:
Here’s a slideshow of some recent illumination work on the Megillat Esther manuscript. It shows the development of one image, the capture of the plotters Bigthan and Teresh. It is based on an image found in the Assyrian bas reliefs at Nineveh, showing Sennacherib’s conquest of Lachish.
Meanwhile, Josh is forging ahead with the calligraphy, and is closing in on completing the manuscript. Sadly, I can’t same the same for the illuminations.
The slideshow below shows the stages in making a mezuzah. I began with a block of bird’s eye maple. Studying the grain of the wood gave me the idea for the design that I carved. I then gilded the face, outlined the letter ‘Shin’ in crimson, and then varnished it. On the back I carved out a niche for the klaf, which will be sealed with a piece of maple veneer.
My last post about the Megillat Esther that Josh and I are producing was back in December.
Here’s a slideshow to give you an update of our work as it has proceeded.
Work on the illuminated Megillat Esther continues.
I recently completed the 11th illumination, an image of an Achaemenid gold cup, probably dating from the time of Xerxes, the ruler who is often thought to be the Achashverosh of the Esther story. Thus, this cup may have actually been used in the revelry that opens the story!
Here’s a short slide show of the stages in producing this image. We see
1. the sketch, with gold ground laid
2. raking light on the gold ground as I prepare to burnish it to a glossy finish
3. close-up, showing the difference between the burnished snakes (uroboros) and the forehead
4. first layer of gold, unburnished
5. illumination completed, fully burnished
6. crystal background completed
The image is 3” x 2”.
While Josh is producing pages of text, I'm working on the illuminations. Here's my most recently completed image, a portrait of Vashti, the king's courageous wife who will not be disgraced as a sex object by the crude and drunken king. The image comes from an Achaemenid silver bowl. This slideshow presents the main stages of the image's development.
Very busy summer... Hope yours was memorable and uplifting.
Since my last post Josh and I have done a lot of work on the megillah. Here's a little slide show of some of what we've been doing. Enjoy!
A quick pic of the first 2 images+ on the storyboard. #1, Akhashverosh is complete; #2, the rhyton is is nearly done; #3, the dancing girl just has the ground for the gold (in pink).
The second image for the megillah is a rhyton (drinking vessel), in this case a solid gold one from the Achaemenid period. The illumination is mostly done now, except for some touch-up. Here's a slideshow of the image as it has progressed...
After gilding Akhashverosh, I began the colorwork, but I ran out of black (for the beard), and it took a few days to replace it. In the meantime I began illumination work on the 2nd image, a gold rhyton (drinking vessel). Concurrently I continued developing the sketches for new images. My recent focus is on some "filler" images, based on Islamic illuminated designs. In the following slideshow you can see my progress...
I failed to mention in my last post on the megillah Josh and I are making, that most of the images are based on Achaemenid artifacts, some, or many of which may date to the very era in which the Esther story takes place. So you art historians, you should have some fun unpacking the history of these images.
I have completed the illumination of the first image, King Akhashverosh, that merry old soul, known in the Greek as Xerxes. He was a real jerkxes. Here are three images...
About 4 months ago Josh and I decided to create our own illuminated manuscript of Megillat Esther, the biblical book that is read on the holiday of Purim. This and the Pesach seder are the Jewish books most commonly illustrated and artistically embellished. Josh and I decided we were ready for the challenge.
Josh is doing the Hebrew calligraphy, and I'm doing the illustrations and illumination. Not surprisingly, Josh is forging ahead much faster than me. Here is a sampling of what we've accomplished...
