“The arts are not a way to make a living. They are very human way of making life more bearable.” – Kurt Vonnegut

Good handwriting can create great impressions, it augments your personality and the person who is watching your writing gets stunned by how beautifully you can write. Maybe you have always received compliments about your handwriting, so why not consider those compliments seriously and think of starting a career in calligraphy??

What is Calligraphy?

Calligraphy is the craft of fine handwriting, a visual art where the legibility of letters may be compromised in favour of visual extravagance. Calligraphy gives your written words more exposure more power. There is enormous pleasure in the calmness and perseverance that comes from the simple, meditative, and inexpensive practice of calligraphy.  Calligraphy provides some practical guides to writing techniques, lettering skills, page design, and decoration skills. Patience, attention, interest, zeal, enthusiasm, aesthetic sense, artistic balance, eye for detail, and vivid imagination are the key skills required for a calligrapher. A calligrapher can achieve success through hard work and regular practice with absolute concentration and determination. The specialties a calligrapher needs to highlight in his/her resume include Designing & Innovation, Alphabetic Study, Cursive Style, Freehand Creative Writing, WordPress, and Squarespace.

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Career in Calligraphy

Calligraphy is an expensive profession that offers a chance to unleash one’s artistic potential. It shows a unique career option for those who have an artistic mind with a creative bend and passion for lettering. No specific degree is needed to learn calligraphy but required excellent artistic talent, creativity, and imaginative skills. Calligraphy skills are used in many areas of art and graphics starting from greetings design to tattoo industry. It is the way of writing beautiful results in a tangible object which can be displayed, gifted or exchanged for other nice things such as admiration, chocolate, concert tickets, cash etc.

Calligraphy provides you learning about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combination. It also leads to the path of success through its implementation in wedding invitations, formal letters, logo designs, and other graphic design projects. Professional calligraphers who specialize in handwriting can do wonders with their artistic skills. They use their excellence for creating new fonts and fancy scripts using various flat and oblique nibs with variety of inks, pens, and brushes. They create attractive texts, maps, memorial documents, religious art, cut stone inscriptions, quotes, poems, testimonials, certificates, letters, and stationery. Calligraphers often possess professional portfolio for showcasing the best samples of their work. The portfolio contains a variety of fonts and styles which are created by using different media, which can be shown to studios when soliciting for employment or freelance works. Innovative professional calligraphers make their living by designing and selling beautifully lettered artwork and other products, by conducting classes and workshops, or by doing body art designing in cooperation with tattoo artists.

Jobs available as a Calligrapher

A professional and creative calligrapher can be hired under the following designations:

  • Calligraphy Instructor
  • CE Instructor – Calligraphy
  • (Language) Calligraphy Specialist
  • Calligraphy Designer/Stylist – Corporate Media & Packaging
  • Craft Designer – Calligraphy
  • Digital Design Specialist – Calligraphy

Salary offered

The basic salary of calligraphy fresher in India starts from INR 15k – 20k and the average salary for a calligrapher in USA is around $ 65,500 per year.

Courses and Institutes

Extensive expertise in designing alphabets, words, and sentences is beneficial for a career in calligraphy. Fine arts courses will provide basics concerning scripts, styles, fonts, strokes, depth, techniques, and methods. Calligraphy can be learned through online and distance learning mode. There is also availability of instruction books and calligraphy-writing kits in order to enhance the skills resulting in an effectual career success. A calligrapher can stay updated on current industry trends and learn about new tools and supplies by taking courses and attending workshops periodically throughout one’s career.

Indian Institutes providing calligraphic courses:

  • Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts (IGNCA), New Delhi
  • Calligraphy India, New Delhi
  • Achyut Pallav School of Calligraphy, Mumbai
  • YMCA, New Delhi
  • Natraj Academy of Fine Art and Animation, Pune
  • Rishihood University, Sonepat
  • Big Art Institute, Thane, Mumbai
  • Zee Institute of Creative Art, Guwahati

The scope of calligraphy never ends as it plays a prominent role in several fields for a variety of purposes. Film and Television companies may need a calligrapher’s service for images and props. Calligraphy has become an integral part in the fields like design, graphics, and typography with the advance in technology and widespread use of computers.

All the best! 🙂

This post first appeared on the getsetResumes.com Blog

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by Ananya Bordoloi
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