Calligraphy Workshop: The line and the loop, seeing through calligraphy

This workshop begins with a short presentation on modern and contemporary letter arts followed with an opportunity to learn how to write in calligraphic script with calligrapher Kevin Honan. There will be time after to consider Fanny Gicquel’s exhibition breathing with heels, walking with eyes through the eyes of a calligrapher.

‘Through the line and the loop, I focused my attention on movement, more precisely on walking. The exhibition is a landscape to walk in, made of line and loop’. –Fanny Gicquel

Fanny Gicquel references the act of drawing in relation to movement through the research, concept and making of her exhibition breathing with heels, walking with eyes. The artist considered how calligraphy, slow gestures and stillness are connected to the feeling produced by engaging with her work and through the movements of the performers who activate the exhibition through performances schedule over the run of the exhibition. Inspired by the calligraphy based drawings of sixteenth century calligraphic writer Francesco Pisani, Gicquel wished to include a calligraphy workshop as an entry point into some of the inspiration and thought process behind the exhibition.

All tools and materials for the session will be provided.

This is an adult workshop, no previous experience in drawing is required.

Kevin Honan, is a calligrapher and student of the history of manuscript production and modern and contemporary letter arts. He is a Member of Peannairí, the Association of Irish Calligraphers and presently chairman of the association. Peannairí was established in October 1987. Its purpose is the encouragement of the calligrapher’s art and craft through classes, workshops and exhibitions.

Fanny Gicquel lives and works in Rennes, France. Her recent solo exhibitions include Hua International, Beijing (2022) and Berlin (2021); the left place the right space, Reims (2020); Passerelle Centre d’art Contemporain, Brest (2020); and Unworlding, Frieze, London (2021).

She is the winner of the Prix du Frac Bretagne – Art Norac. The prize aims to support Bretagne-based artists at an international level, by partnering with an international organisation to realise a solo exhibition for the awarded artist. This is Gicquel’s first solo exhibition in Ireland.