Jonah and the Whale Example of Micrography
My interest in the issues around retrieving digital images evolved from my interest in art, text, the intersection of the two, a project, a penchant for organization, and a library science degree.
Several years ago I learned Photoshop with a particular project in mind. After working on that project for a year and a half, I had a new idea. This idea was to create a large rose, using one of my watercolors, but to make an image of the rose exclusively out of words. The original inspiration for this was my discovery of micrography. Not the micrography that is about photos of microscopic things; rather the micrography that has been practiced for hundreds of years by Jewish artists. Jewish micrography creates images related to the texts from which they are made.
For example, as shown here, the text of the book of Jonah is used to create the boat on the water, the whale, etc. The text is written in calligraphy but in a virtually microscopic form. From what I understand this art form was an outgrowth of the prohibition against making images. An online exhibit of micrography including this image can be found at the site of the Micrography Exhibit at the Jewish Theological Society . [click to continue…]
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