By Ruth Rowland
Earlier in the month, I was honoured to learn that I had won The Peter Esslemont Prize for Calligraphy and Illumination 2024, awarded by the Worshipful Company of Scriveners.
Peter Esslemont Prize for Calligraphy and Illumination: Ruth Rowland with The Master Scrivener
The prize ceremony was held at the Sheriffs’ Quill Pen Reception at the beautiful St-Mary-Le-Bow Church. Surrounded by the gorgeous decor, it was inspiring to receive my award and exhibit my work at such an historic venue.
In the middle ages, St Mary-le-Bow was famous for its bell which was rung to indicate the end of the working day, if you could hear the Bow bell, you were considered to be a Londoner or ‘cockney’.
Peter Esslemont Prize for Calligraphy and Illumination:
St-Mary-Le_Bow Church
Peter Esslemont Prize for Calligraphy and Illumination:
St-Mary-Le_Bow Church
Some of the work I put forward for consideration was created as examples for gilding workshops I taught at the British Library and Wallace Collection. If you’d like to see the artwork in more detail, click through to the posts on my Fantasy Gilded Initials for at the British Library Workshop or the Gilded Illustration Workshop at the Wallace Collection.
Peter Esslemont Prize for Calligraphy and Illumination Artworks
I also put forward some examples of my experiments combining different coloured precious metals. The pieces below are part of my Gilded Leafy Bower series, raised gilding using red gold, moon gold, platinum and palladium.
Peter Esslemont Prize for Calligraphy and Illumination:
Illuminated Letter S
Peter Esslemont Prize for Calligraphy and Illumination:
Illuminated Letter B
With thanks to The Worshipful Company of Scriveners, I am delighted to be able to use the prize to further my gilding studies and I am looking forward to attending a specialist gilding workshop later this year. More about that in a later post!
