it's always something...

it seems one thing has always led to another in that studio of mine,

over and over and over again...

within the ink-making workshop I took recently, there was some discussion about writing set-up and ink safety, of the spillage kind

one suggestion was to put your ink bottle in the centre of a decent-sized ramekin - that way, if the bottle was inadvertently knocked over, the ink would be contained 

I thought that a very clever idea, which led me to wonder about other suggestions, knowing full well there would most likely be some very creative ideas

before I could even type that in to a search engine, I wandered up to my studio to have a look at some vintage ink bottles I bought many years ago

the first has a nice wide base and a narrow neck, hard to tip and a nice controlled area for dipping the nib... it just looks too nice with beads stored in it, and then what would I put them in?

the next doesn't seem like it would be quite as stable

and then of course, it holds my special buttons...

when I finally did do an online search a number of images of antique inkwells appeared, some on eBay and Etsy... an hour later and I'd found myself a beaten and battered wooden tray with two "broken" crystal ink bottles

it arrived in short order, most definitely looking a little worse for wear

the crystal bottles themselves weren't broken, it was the brass lids that had issues

I think originally they were a hinged lid - but all that remained was the rings around the neck, one of which was no longer attached and disintegrating... the image below is from the Etsy listing

an hour of polishing the brass, removing the broken neck-piece and a lucky find of the perfect sized cork stopper and it looked like this...

the bottle on the left holds tiny salt spoons, the perfect size for stirring my pigmented inks

the one on the right contains iron-gall ink

indentations at the front and back are for pen holders and/or nibs

if you look very closely at the base of the bottles you'll see brass holders - they're about 1/2" high and there are four, the perfect way to prevent spillage

making ink and using a dip pen have been two of the most thought-provoking things I have done in a long, long time

a deep connection to what came before, a time when the act of writing was both an experience and a privilege 

I find I pay more attention to how I write, the forming of the letters, noticing nuances of line like never before

the sound and feel of the paper also have an impact on the experience but the very best part, my most favourite thing is at the end of the page, before turning to the next, is carefully pressing the last few lines with blotting paper

 this paper could perform many more blots but I see such possibilities in these marks as they are, the remnants of words not yet hard and fast on the page 

a metaphor of sorts?

 a lightening of the intensity, of words that have tumbled fast and furious from the pen

after all, that is what my morning writing practice is meant to do

could the act of blotting be the final release?

on the other hand, this paper represents fragments of words, snatched from sentences, page after page of thought and musing...  tangled thought, layered over time

it is as much of me as the filled pages in the book 

I feel the stirring of something, a shift in perspective... I'm still knee-deep in making books but now with the added layer of their relationship to the act of writing 

and the words they contain

and with that shift, a new body of work beginning to take shape