Word as Art: Beauty in the Margins

Writing is an essential part of everyday communication yet every time we put words down on a page, or type them on a screen, we are creating a piece of art unique to us. Inspired by the Slade 150 anniversary this year, and curated in partnership with students of the Slade School of Fine Art at UCL, this exhibition explores the permeable borders between art and writing in a rich variety of formats that celebrate the way in which we have embellished the word. The online exhibition, opening in October 2021, includes three pieces of student art alongside items from UCL Special Collections. A physical presence for the exhibition will be located in the Main Library from December 2021-July 2022.

To learn more about the Slade 150 celebration, visit the anniversary website.

Copyright statement: All images on this site are protected by copyright. They may be copied to your own computer for personal study or research but may not be distributed, re-used in any way or broadcast without written permission from Library Services at UCL. For further information, please see our Special Collections web pages.

A book sits open on a double page spread. Each page is elaborately decorated in floral designs using blues, red and yellow and a large amount of gold leaf. Persian Arabic handwritten script runs down the centre of each page, bordered in gold.

Mír shams al-Dín Faqír Dihlavi, Masnavi-i Akbar Sultan

A single leaf of a book reveals a detailed decorated blue and gold leaf border using geometric designs around handwritten Arabic script.

Fragment of the Holy Qur’an

A page of a book with gold leaf Hebrew script at the top and bottom of the page surrounded by green, blue and pink or red patterns. In the centre is black Hebrew script and sitting vertically on the right side is a red, black and green wavy design.

Haggadah (Sephardic)

A double page spread in a book reveals neatly handwritten script in black, blue and red. At the bottom of the page, reaching to almost half way up behind the text is a hand drawn line drawing of a cityscape.

Book of prayers [Gebetbuch]

A page of parchment, cut to the shape of a book cover but with a corner section cut out. The manuscript features modal early music notation. The staff is drawn in red ink, notes in black diamond shapes and words are handwritten in black with red and blue.

Antiphonal

An image of a page of parchment, cut to the shape of a book cover, that reveals modal early music notation. The staff is drawn in red ink, notes in black diamond shapes and words are handwritten in black with red and blue historiated letters.

Leaf from an antiphonal, parchment

Six cards reveal photographic images of musical notation found in different shop frontages and in a girl's arm tattoo.

Shuffle

A page of a scrapbook that includes a hand written note in neat cursive lettering. Another note is stuck next to it in a different hand. Above are sketches and an embroidery sample.

Sampler

A notebook open on a double page spread. The left page is full of blue ink cursive handwritten script and the page on the right features some large lettering rendered in blues and reds.

Cross Stitch

A black background with white geometric patterns on it. Superimposed over this is a photograph of a woman sitting in her bedroom. The walls, bed duvet, and woman are painted black with white geometric patterns.

Patterns in My Bedroom

Two pages of a book featuring heavily illustrated pages in black and white with curling floral patterns. The left page reveals a title in a calligraphy style font and the right page features modern printed text that mimics Medieval traditions.

The Golden Legend of Master William Caxton done anew

An A4 page featuring a black and white print of a garden bird surrounded by foliage and rendered with high contrast. Around this image is calligraphy style script in various sizes and alignments, providing title and explanatory text.

Poster: 'Learning in the Primary School'

A Book of Bones’ by David Church

A Book of Bones

An A4 page featuring a black and white print of a garden bird surrounded by foliage and rendered with high contrast. Around this image is calligraphy style script in various sizes and alignments, providing title and explanatory text.

My Book about the potato

A small wooden framed slate with wax in the centre. Three different children have scratched writing into the table. They have written over each other, making the tablet difficult to read.

Wax Tablet

Handwriting practice, China

Handwriting practice, China

A piece of paper that says ‘No Pain, No Gain’ in Mandarin. Page also has an outline of a right hand, including a ring and a scar on the top of the hand.

Handwriting practice, China

Wooden letters that have been cut into the shape of undercase Sassoon typeface letters.

Wooden Alphabet Letters, lowercase

A section of medieval manuscript page with black script. On the right is a decorated S in blue and pink ink. The top of the S has a face in a green hood. The bottom of the S has a monster with the torso of a woman playing a fiddle.

Inhabited letter ‘S’ on a parchment manuscript fragment from a breviary, possibly 13th century

A printed page with decorated letters. The top middle section of the page is blank. A capital H has been decorated with a green foliage pattern. It is surrounded with gold leaf and a blue and pink frame. Foliage surrounds the right side of the frame.

Decretum cum summario Joannis de Deo Hispani

A printed page laid out in two columns. Bottom of page includes an engraving of two men in some woods, followed by two men being discovered by a dog. At the beginning of the left column is a blank area with a small handwritten n in the corner.

Commento di Christophoro Landino fiorentino sopra La commedia di Dante Alighieri poeta fiorentino

A printed page laid out in two columns. At the top of the right column is an engraving of four men resting in a desert area with some wild cats. On the right is a printed N decorated with a printed vine pattern.

La commedia

Page printed in black ink. Decorated by hand with red, blue and purple ink lines. On the right is a large D with printed decorations of two climbing children and a dog. The initial is decorated in a medieval style with red, blue and purple ink.

Elegiae, sive Carmina

A page of written gothic-style text. Capital letters in blue. Letters at the beginning of paragraphs are red in blue squares decorated with kingfishers. Blue border decorated with kingfishers on top and left of page. Large kingfisher in left corner.

Brixistanthing log book 1930 – 1933

A room full of a single tall scroll of paper covered with writing. An open doorway through some photography lights can be seen.

Scriptorium

A printed page of text. On the right and left of the main text are small snippets of text printed vertically.

‘Clarissa, or, the History of a Young Lady’ by Samuel Richardson (London: Printed for F. C. and J. Rivington, 1810)

A handwritten letter. A letter has been written horizontally on a large sheet of paper. A different hand has written a reply vertically on top of the letter. The handwriting is difficult to read and the layers create a crisscross pattern.

Letter from Sophia Frend (later Mrs Sophia De Morgan) to Augustus De Morgan

Warped text in different languages laid out in a grid that has been distorted as if it is waving. Behind the grid is a textile pattern in pale pink colours decorated with organic treelike shapes.

a love letter that must have been mistranslated in part

A printed page of Hebrew script. Along the side is a twisting pattern culminating in two hands and a crown like shape at the top of the page. The twisting pattern, hand and crown are made of Hebrew letters.

Address to Moses Montefiore Samuel Shulman, from Jerusalem

A single card. Letters have been printed in cog and arrow shapes in a jumbled manner. Jumbled letters printed in black. Information about the author and printer are at the bottom of the page. Information printed in red.

Plakat

Two pages. Left printed in black with yellow blots. French letters in spiralling patterns and a trombone. Right printed in black with green blots. Text of varying sizes with drawings of soldiers arresting a man.

Fin de Copenhagen by Asger Jorn and G.E. Debord

A single page on which a large black square has been printed.

The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman

A few puzzle pieces that have been fitted together inside a small box. On top of the puzzle pieces a landscape showing a river and two hills has been painted.

Pastoral fragments

A box lid that says ‘In Search of the Ordinary.’

In Quest of the Ordinary