Johan Calligrapher

The first time I entered a print shop I felt shy but fascinated at the roaring noise of the offset machines that marked the rhythm of the workshop. My dad worked in that print shop and thanks to his influence some of the designers there started teaching me drawing. It was in 1982. For many years I worked as a designer in the graphic industry, then I studied and finally worked for newspapers as an illustrator and computer designer. Throughout all these years, I was lucky enough to come across people who really wanted to see me learn and grow. They taught me colours and portions, type faces and papers as well as a sense of quality and patience, all that makes one a good professional. Now that I have a lot of know-how on many subjects in the artistic field, I want to turn to one art in particular - calligraphy. Calligraphy requires patience, passion, good taste and enjoyment. All these I put into my work when I started devoting my time to producing calligraphy works. I write poems in artistic letters, copy documents and produce creations in Gothic letters, in Fraktur, Batarda, Lombarda, Oncial, Insular letters, hebrew... illustrating my thoughts with ink and a steel point pen. Calligraphy is an exercise for the soul: interpreting a text and transcribing it as a unique object in various languages. This is my work ! And the same fascination I felt as a child in front of the printing machines everybody can feel now watching a piece of calligraphy. Since I started writing I cannot stop and I am never tired of going over every letter of every alphabet with which I create my calligraphy pieces. Johan.