Something a little fishy
December 14, 2011
Fish Netsuke maquette in plasticene
It has taken me a little while to decide which design to carve next after I finished my Dormouse Netsuke.
I decided out of all the possibilities I had ready on a fish. I did have a different maquette ready to go than the one in the image but somehow something was wrong with it, it just didn’t look right.
So I spent an evening with some books and images of fish and made up several plasticene fish. These turned out much much better than the original I had come up with. I decided that I liked this one the best for this carving.
I curled him around to give that lovely circular feel even though I know that this cannot happen in real life. I’m not quite sure where the Himitoshi will go just yet but that will work itself out as I go along.
Finding a piece of wood that felt right was strangely difficult even though I have lots to choose from, most just weren’t right for this piece. Either too bland or amazingly too full of grain pattern or the wrong shape. I eventually settled on a lovely piece of Walnut and have started the rough carving.
Progress reports on my mini sculpture will follow.
Comments (0) | Tags: carving, Fish, Fish Netsuke, Netsuke, sculpture, Stiller Designs, Walnut, wood carving, wood sculpture, woodcarving
A bit of Angel carving
December 12, 2011
Angel carved in Jelutong
Something I have wanted to do for ages is carve angels, don’t ask me why I have no idea. I was talking about it this time last year and now I’ve finally done it. Well I’ve carved one, the first of many, I hope.
I have tried to design an angel several times before but never got the right feel until now. I didn’t want a ‘cutesy’ angel. I didn’t want an angel that was specifically male or female, those in the bible are all male, most other angels seem to be female.
Carved from an offcut of Jelutong wood from another job, this angel is roughly 18cm tall, 11cm wide and under 2.5cm deep. I am now debating whether to do anything else to finish the figure.
The options under discussion are painting (maybe white maybe another colour), gilding – gold or silver, or just putting a wax finish on as is. I’m not quite sure as yet.
This is a wall hanging angel, and I have several other designs ready to go depending on whether I want to glue wood together to get a wider wing span or stick with the width of wood available.
I think that now I have found my angel ‘mojo’ I’ll be carving a few more.
I’d love to know what you think of this angel, leave me a comment below or on Twitter @StillerDesigns
Comments (2) | Tags: angel, carved wooden angel, carving, Christmas, handcarved, Jelutong, sculpture, Stiller Designs, wall art, wings, wood angel, wood carving, wood sculpture, woodcarving, wooden angel
When is a picture framer not a picture framer?
November 19, 2011
Carved frame in Jelutong
………when they don’t frame pictures.
Eh? But you said that you make picture frames!
Yes I do.
Before you run screaming from the computer at this potentially confusing answer let me explain what I mean.
This whole question of what does or doesn’t make someone a picture framer has come up quite a lot recently. Mainly due to the fact that I’ve just moved workshop and I’ve had to explain what I do to a whole new group of people. They immediately lock me into the picture framer ‘box’ in their mind.
Yes I do make and carve picture frames, but I don’t generally have anything to do with putting the artwork into the frame. This is what I believe makes someone a picture framer, they pull together all the elements and actually put them together.
As far as picture frames are concerned I am basically a link in a chain of events. I specialise in making the frame to the best of my ability to the exact size given so that the next specialist link can do their part to the best of their ability, and so on down the chain.
By getting several specialists to work together on a job you get a far superior finished article done in a timely fashion.
Don’t get me wrong I can do it, I can follow the job through from start to finish completely its just that I don’t. I wholeheartedly believe that you should know something about the parts of the job that come after and/or before your part so that you can spot potential mistakes and not pass any on. For example a carver can make a gilders job incredibly difficult by the way that they carve the frame.
If we all tried to do each others job I don’t think the outcome would be as polished and it would also take a lot longer.
This is also why I introduce myself as a woodcarver specialising in frame carving rather than a picture framer.
Although for some people it seems to be easier for them to call me a picture framer, I think often they just honestly don’t know the difference.