How Much Wood?
How Much Wood? When we were kids my father decided that, as an antidote to TV, we needed to learn how to whittle. We were already not watching much TV, only the occasional sitcom (with the whole family eating popcorn), but he insisted on cutting out animal shapes in his basement workshop. He carved a horse first to show us how, and I followed suit. I took to it right away! I imitated his horse carving first, then, with a bit more skill under my belt, I carved an elephant next. During my first year at The Putney SchooI I carved the pig with much more skill. Later, still at Putney, I carved the large Indian Boy in my sculpture class taught by Robin Campbell. The strange Celtic/Beijing opera like face was carved on Red Star Commune outside of Beijing, China. That’s where I lived with my aunt and uncle, who were farm machinery experts and lived on the other side of the wall from the opera house. I used to sit on top of the wall peering through a small window in the bricks for free Beijing opera concerts.
Long before all this art carving took place, I had helped my father build book shelves for the living room, and a raft for the pond in my grandmother’s back yard!
When I was 10 I helped him install a fence for the horses he bought me. We also built a horse stall together inside of an old retired truck body that he bought for $300 bucks!
So began my love of wood as an art medium!
FAVORITE WOODEN
SPECIMENS
CURRENT WOODEN
WORKS
In a Meredith College interview series I was asked What is your favorite medium? …and the answer to that question is that it would have to be wood.
Watch the video interview to find out more:
