One day I decided to rewrite the traditional prayers of my Catholic girlhood (The Our Father, Hail Mary, etc.) to reflect my own spiritual experience. After so doing, I wanted to commit these altered prayers to the page with as much effort, concentration and longevity as their predecessors in the Middle Ages. To this end, I studied calligraphy with Karen Gorst at the (now defunct) School of Sacred Arts in New York City. There I learned the humanist hand, the delicate art of gilding, medieval recipes for paint and ink, and how to prepare and letter on vellum. I was then able to create the set of twelve prayers, hand-lettered on vellum. I ornamented them with drawings of flowers, birds and celestial bodies and illuminated them with gold and semi-precious stones. They were exhibited at a one-woman show at Marymount Manhattan College in New York City, as well as in upstate New York.

This is a picture of The Creed from that series.

This is a picture of a Quaker wedding certificate I lettered. It includes Gold and semi-precious stones as well.

Another piece I am pleased with is The Codicils, from Psychic Politics by Jane Roberts. These are a set of twelve "alternate hypotheses as a base for private and public experience." The Codicils struck me as ideas which are flexible and native to our consciousness. My design was intended to reflect this. I handlettered The Codicils on pieces of chamois-skin and strung them together on a bamboo framework. The piece is designed to feel as though it can travel with us wherever we go.

Here is a detail from that piece.