Why are you a carver?

[Janel]

I have been working on a project that has involved a thoughtful review of my journey as an artist. This lengthy exercise reminds me of the many steps taken to be where I am today. It has also helped me focus on where I would like to be going with my work, with gaining new skills that would allow my work to continue to grow.

 

How did you choose to become a carver? Where has it led you? What keeps you committed to it?

 

Please feel welcome to share your journey with the rest of us, whether you are new to carving or an old hand.

 

Janel

[Don Barnhill]

A chance meeting with Tom Wolfe in Gatlinburg, Tenn. began my carving journey. Tom was carving his little hound dogs and I bothered him for at least an hour. He was very helpful and encouraged me to try carving. SInce that time I have carved several hundred pieces. I hope each is better than the last. I don't carve everyday, only when I feel the need. I may go several months and not do a carving, then I will get the urge and carve dozens of things. It seems that I'm always drawn back to carving.

I am entirely self taught through the use of books and trial and error. I was extremely happy to find The Carving Path.

[Mike Ruslander]

Although I'm not primarily a carver, I've been carving one thing or another since I was a teen. I've always admired the fine wood carvings of old Europe and tiki carvings were the rage when I was a youngster. I guess I took it more seriously when I met and became friends with Ron Frazier. Ron is a pre-eminent knifemaker who early on in his career added carving and other embellishments to his knives. Handmade knives started gaining recognition and value in the mid 1970's and I met Ron and became his close friend in 1977. This was like knowing Elvis or John Lennon (talent-wise) so who couldn't have been inspired when I was able to see these wonderful and unique creations coming forth. There are a lot of incredible knifemakers out there. Two that come to mind are Mr. Broadwell and Mr. Fogg right here on our little forum. Ron was a pioneer in the field, who invisioned and created a lot of the demand for what the knife market is today. Unfortunately with the rise of milling machines and other computer controlled equipment much quality work is almost like a production piece. Some beginners make perfect knives in months, not years. He opened my eyes to Japanese style work, San Francisco style, Art Nouveau, and a myriad of other exotic and functional pieces. He also carves free standing pieces. He was the man who opened my eyes to Netsuke. Since he was closer to me than some of my own family, I guess I wanted to be just like him. But I will say, few people possess the talents and abilities that Ron did. Ron's pushing 70 now and his health isn't so good. He's a rough, tough salt of the earth type guy, whose hands made magic. Try to find pics of his work on the web if you can, there aren't many. He's not a webhead. I always channel Ron when I do get to create something. I come here to TCP for education, because here, I also get inspired by world class work.

[Dave London]

Lets see where to start, Well as a child a long time ago I carved wood figures with a barlow knife, (yes this was when childern were allowed to be childern and knives and guns were taken to school and no one was ever hurt) even remember making a tiki key fob Later while in the service I carved/filed mecury dimes into charms for my soon to be wife, Then life got in the way got to make a living kids mortage got to grow up (do I have too).

Still loved to work with my hands mostly to make a living but still managed to have hobbys fishing hunting hikeing. One winter day in the late 1980's a saturday as i remember I was watching PBS and a show came on called Wood Carving with Rick Butz and he carved a chickadee. I thought I can do that and remembered the carving as a child with my pen knife, off to the wood shop I went, bought basswood and Butz book some knives and gouges and started carving. Got pretty good at birds not world class but decent, Became allergic to wood dust (yea I have the carving boxes etc but the stuff is unbearable) So I started to do bronze sculpture, clay wax etc lot of fun and folks will pay for bronze more than for wood Go figure they have no idea.

Then I got interested in metal engraving ( no foundrys to mess with etc ) after around One class and six years of off and on practice mostly off and retiring from my bread and butter job, I feel that I am at a journyman level engraver. Now I am trying to combine the engraving with repousse . Help I am a tool addict Dave

[Mark Strom]

It has been awhile since I posted and happened to be home and saw this topic. I knew in kindergarten that I wanted to have a creative career or rather knew that I wanted to spend my life having fun creating things. Before I was a carver there were many other starts that led to carving. Those starts included a couple of years doing batiks, a little dab of fiber arts and 7 years as a potter. I still love turning pots but don't have the opportunity. All those avenues did not grip me nor did they prove to be as challenging as to hold my attention.

 

In 1979 I was given the opportunity to take some time to start fresh in the creative world, given the time to look things over. I started with $50 worth of xacto tools and a piece of wood from the firewood pile. I was hooked immediately. There were so many subjects, so many different woods and it was not easy. Most of all after finishing a piece, I actually felt like I had created something. Sounds strange but sculpture brought something to life in me as well.

 

Now after 25+ years I am challenged everyday, carving something different all the time and still feel like I am a novice carver. Carving has taught me patience, compromise and has given me a philosophy to live by. It has also connected me to the past and the future. My tools are the same used by carvers of old and I am leaving a legacy that the generations that come after me in my family will be able to see with little effort. It has not made me rich with money but it certainly has made my life rich with experience, people and joy. As I tell people, I am retired and have been for over 25 years. People work all their lives to retire and then do what I have done all my life. I know because I teach classes to those retirees.

 

To see the latest project see the post under new work.

 

Mark

[RUSS]

 

. It has not made me rich with money but it certainly has made my life rich with experience, people and joy. As I tell people, I am retired and have been for over 25 years. People work all their lives to retire and then do what I have done all my life. I know because I teach classes to those retirees.

 

love this part at the end Mark...Not contributed for a while myself, but sometimes lurk........

 

.......Must remember this one the next time I carve.....

[Phil White]

Good question!

 

I don't really know. But I do know that some of my earliest memories are of carving 2X4 studs in the basement of my family home with my dad's chisels, and getting my first pocket knife when I was about 5, which in turn assised in my progressive weakening of the foundation, as well as the local trees. Since that time, I have been happiest when I am carving, and depressed when I am not.

 

Fortunately, I am able to make a good living at it, but if I wasn't, I would be happy carving for myself, without any monetary gain whatsoever.

 

Phil

[Leonid_g]

Carving a "cry of my soul"

[Janel]

Carving has been an integral part of my work since I began my journey as a potter in 1970, as a junior in college. We learned to draw along with making pots, which then could be translated into surface design in one way or another.

 

Drawing helps me to understand form and detail. In the earliest years of carving, drawing became bas relief on stoneware and porcelain clay. Inspiration from nature, emerging leaves and flowers in the spring, dried leaves of autumn and winter, the insects and small creatures hiding in branches or grass, all became subjects for carving.

 

 

As my worked evolved while making pottery for a living, I was taking time to draw and carve. First it was a few days, then a couple of weeks and towards the end of my years as a potter, I was exploring carving a couple of months a year. By then, I resented having to quit and return to making pots for my living.

 

 

In the mid 1980’s I left making stoneware and porcelain pots behind, and explored carving on a more limited range of porcelain pots and tiles. This led to refining the scope of what I was carving and focused on using small, porcelain, lidded boxes as the “canvas” for shallow relief carving. Celadon and pale blue glazes pooled in the more deeply carved areas while being fired.

 

 

This drawing is the plan for the walking stick lidded box. The drawing was done on one side of the tracing paper. Shading is done on the other side, to work out the depth and shading of the composition

 

 

 

The compositions on the boxes featured foreground, middle-ground and background areas, which were enhanced by the effect of the pooled glaze---causing a greater sense of depth. The surface of the glazed, carved lids were smooth from the rather thick application of glaze.

 

When subjects began to emerge from the shallow relief carving, I began to experiment with 3-dimensional sculptural carving. An unglazed area, was needed to prevent the glaze from becoming fused with glaze to the kiln support. I was not satisfied with either choice - whether to glaze or not to glaze the little sculptures… Thus began the five year argument with myself as I explored the potential of sculptural carving in porcelain.

 

I emerged from a 25-year career as a potter, to become a carver of wood. Porcelain was no longer the right material for me to be carving.

 

Working with wood began in the summer of 1995. I was ready, after years of consideration, frustration and carving porcelain with only a subtractive technique.

 

The transition to wood took place rather suddenly that summer of 1995 with this little frog, when a porcelain piece I was working on cracked as it was being carved. I made a couple of small carving tools then began to explore a piece of boxwood, and that was it.

 

[Don Barnhill]

Janel,

 

I love the frog.

 

I haven't really carved anything in a while. I should be carving every day but can't seem to make myself do it. I'll get the urge and have to carve for several months, then I'll have a dry spell like now.

 

Are you self taught or did you attend classes and seminars?

 

I also paint and draw. Thanks for sharing the photo's.

 

Don

[Don Barnhill]

I really like the porcelain boxes too. You do very fine work. Be glad I don't live nearby as I would rapidly turn into a pest at your workshop. So much to learn and so little time.

 

Don

[Janel]

Hi Don,

 

Thank you. I like frogs, can you tell? Except for the training in pottery making, I am self-taught as a carver of clay, wood, and other materials. My love of the subjects, materials and the process drive me forward to learn and grow with what I do.

 

Janel

[Doug Sanders]

Janel- I quite like that clay tile of the oak laef you've shown. The texture of the clay, subject and carving style all work well together. Have you done other tiles?

[Janel]

Thanks Doug,

 

Only a few tiles were made along the way. Flat clay has its problems when carved and then fired. Especially porcelain clay. I did not pursue formulating clay that would not crack or warp for use with tiles, though I knew what to do about it. Back then, the thrown pots were the income, and the tiles were the exploration.

 

Janel

[Cornel]

I am very fascinated to be in the creative process, to change a rough piece of wood into an exciting illusion.....(I hope so )

Two times in my life, I was meeting Guy Shaw and his crazy work was and is so amazing, that it was like an ignition for my

creativity.

After some years of carving under the netsuke-rules, I more and more like to express just an idea......without borders, or only with the

border of my hands and eyes.

To carve and to manage our life with this art, give me the satisfaction to be independent and a little bit the illusion to be the master of my

24 hours. I remember my childhood, the school was always a slavery and outside were so much more interesting things......so I was

always rather hungry for freedom, to do what I love. To carve, to develope this talent is now my freedom. To be my master and the

pupil at the same time, to be in this neverending process of learning new techniques and effects......thatswy I like to jump out of the bed

early in the morning

If I am in middle of the process to shape the wood and if I can forget the time and all the not necessary things around me, then it is like the

play of a child.......no time pressure, no thought for money, no disharmonie, thatswhy I am a carver !

 

 

 

 

 

 

http://www.cornelschneider.ch

[WCraig]

I have been working on a project that has involved a thoughtful review of my journey as an artist. This lengthy exercise reminds me of the many steps taken to be where I am today. It has also helped me focus on where I would like to be going with my work, with gaining new skills that would allow my work to continue to grow.

 

How did you choose to become a carver? Where has it led you? What keeps you committed to it?

 

Please feel welcome to share your journey with the rest of us, whether you are new to carving or an old hand.

 

Janel

My journey fells like a very long gestation. as a boy without any training (8 yrs. Old) I used my dads tools in his shop to make swords, spears, and knives for my plastic Vikings. Later i bought a small wood carving set for wood. My mother did not understand that this was a legimate lifes path. and continually disposed of my carvings and tools. The family broke up in my middle teens and work and survival became paramont. Now in my 7th decade I am becoming who I was supposed to be. At last. a carver of wood, metal, stone. Currently I have studied with Donn Salt/Deborah Wilson at Mike burkeleos in Frement CA. Angela Conty at the calif. jewelry training Institute, Carmichael, CA. I will spend a week with Glenn Leherer Summer 2009. Hopefully I will study with The CJTI for basic jewery Metal work 2009, 7 months.

 

I feel that i am who I am supposed to for the first time in my life. If you are at the beginning of your life look to this story as an example. It is better to follow your muse than to be not that which you destined to be. All success is ashes unless.

[Janel]

Thank you WCraig for your message to us all. Learning is a life long pursuit, and you exemplify this beautifully. Congratulations for finding your way along the path and for encouraging us to keep at it!

 

Janel

[fkvesic]

Well done, WCraig! Your comments are proof that it's never too late to pursue your deepest interest and that should prove insprational to both young and old.

[Brent Duty]

I feel that i am who I am supposed to for the first time in my life. If you are at the beginning of your life look to this story as an example. It is better to follow your muse than to be not that which you destined to be. All success is ashes unless.

 

 

I know exactly how you feel for the first time in my life I believe in myself and am learning to conquer my demons of fear and negative thoughts. I always knew what I wanted, but I was afraid to fail at something so close to my heart. I was willing to fail at another life, someone that wasn't me to protect my dream. I feel like I just woke from a coma, but it was all self induced. It's amazing what you can do and feel with positivity and believing yourself and that your art is worthy ...I feel like Ironman nowadays. Thanks for the daily bread crumb of reinforcement!

[E George]

The Creative Force that is present in all artists really shines in the posts in this thread. I beleive this Creative Force is spiritual in nature. That perception is supported by ancient pretroglyphs: they were made and yet had no direct bearing on the artist's survival (i.e. not useful in providing anceint man with food or shelter). To have some of this mysterious Force is wonderful and is to be enjoyed and celibrated.

 

In order to maintain their houses my grand dad and dad were wood workers. Eventually, both enjoyed wood working as an avocation. Dad made sure that I and my brother had our own work bench and tools that were scaled for the hands of small boys.

 

One Christmas I received a wood carving kit that contained a red handled X-acto knife and some blanks of animals. I don't remember ever working on the carvings. However, when I was 13 or 14 there was the Tiki fad and everyone who was cool wore a little plastic Tiki on a cord around the neck . I wanted to be cool too and Tikis were simple to carve and so I got out my red handled X-acto and started carving.

 

In the midst of the Tiki fad, I found a picture of a stylized bear sculpture that I thought I could carve. I got piece of firewood was about the right size and I started without a sketch or reference pictures. When the bear was complete I had an epiphany: I had no knowledge of bear anatomy. So, I went to Leary's Book store ( now long gone) and bought a copy of "Whittling with Ben Hunt" that had a bear pattern in it and a lot of other interesting things to carve as well.

So, with red handled X-acto in one hand and book in the other I started my adventure on "The Carving Path". That was about five decades ago.

 

Though never my profession, it has given me great pleasure and enjoyment even while serving in Vietman. With apologies to George Lucas, I say to all, "May the Creative Force be with you."