The focus of this symposium was to explore the potential of words through creative poetry workshops and to apply these textural based materials into calligraphy via practical masterclasses.

The world-renowned American calligrapher Thomas Ingmire was invited as the guest director of Writing 2011, and in collaboration with him we have put together a programme that focused on the theme of ‘Working with the Text’: an one hour session each morning with the visiting Poet in Residence David Annwn and calligrapher, Thomas Ingmire offered a daily springboard for all symposium participants A variety of masterclasses followed, allowing participants to work with symposium tutors who approached text through different kinds of artefacts such as collages, in book form, (short and extended or responding to place as well as text) and working with glass (and blasting, lampworking and pyrographics), thus, allowing participants to gain new insights and to have the boundaries of their creativity expanded no matter what level they are at.