AoA - Katerina Falconer de Lanark

On the heels of the MoD for Remy, comes the AoA for his wife. Katerina Falconer de Lanark. An inspiring warrior woman who I was honored to do this for. Again it was another scroll that I was actually requested for. Remy approached me at the end of Northern Region and actually requested a specific piece that I was in the process of working on.

He had seen it previously and knew it would be perfect for her.

Now, I'm no wordsmith, so I told him he had to get me the words, but other then that, I did the Illumination and Calligraphy. And she received the award at Pennsic 46.

Research:

With this particular piece, I had originally set out to find something to depict a female warrior; I'd say this hit the nail on the head pretty hard. I had come across pieces by Abraham  Bosse when I was looking for inspiration for Remy's MoD, and this particular piece just struck me as amazing. 

Below is the original inspiration piece, you can find the source here, as well.

Judith and Holfernes by Abraham Bosse circa 1645

Materials:

Pergamenata

Higgins Black Magic Ink

Ink Dip Pens

Progress:

Part of my fascination with this piece was the amazing depth that was portrayed along with the confidence that simply radiates from it. Confidence, poise and grace all rolled into one image.

While I don't have any pictures of the draft itself, I will say that I went through the same process as I usually do. Find the image, get the sizing, refine the details, transfer to Perg, and finally, Ink. I do have a few in progress photos after the transfer to Perg had already been started. 

Final before calligraphy.

So, as you can see, when I did the spacing, I noticed that it would look like it was missing something; something that would make the move over to calligraphy seem less abrupt, as it were. So, I decided to accent the first letter, bring some dramatic emphasis to the start. Hence the cadel 'L'. 

Draft of the cadel 'L' before it was transferred to the perg. 

The calligraphy I decided to go with the Early Gothic font that matched the feel of the piece. That particular bit took a healthy amount of practice for me, as I'm still not the best hand at calligraphy. But, after several drafts I was finally pleased with the look and moved onto the final calligraphy on the perg. 

Early Gothic calligraphy, prior to pencil lines erased. 

One of the really fun things I like to do when I get a piece, is get little snippets of the person themselves into the piece. For this I reached out to Remy. I knew that Katerina had at that time started working on some black work so I asked him to sneak a picture of a few of the designs she was attempting. He sent me a few and I chose one to actually include into the collar of the woman's garb.

A small touch of blackwork for a personal touch. 

The image of Kate's blackwork that Remy sent me.

A few other little personal touches were added in; such as the Carolingian Caliver's flag and an ode to Captain Marvel via star bursts. For those that don't know, Katerina actually HAS garb/armor fashioned after Captain Marvel's uniform.

Caliver's Flag

Star bursts in ode to Captain Marvel.

Final Product:

Final product, though the tip of the sword is missing from the picture.

End Thoughts:

All in all, I'm actually pretty happy with how this piece came out. I feel as though the confidence and grace came through really well. And I think it depicts Kate's personality; fierce, graceful and courageous.

I'm sad I wasn't there to see it go out, hopefully there are pictures of it being handed to her in court that I can sneak a peek at later. Kate seemed pleased with the end result, and ultimately that's my goal. I want to make people smile with my art. I'm really happy that Remy requested I do this scroll for her.

Vivat Lady Katerina!