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Long Island Woodworkers Show Published On 11-10-2010 , 11:32 AM If my local followers need something to do this coming weekend, November 13 & 14, please come to the Long Island Woodworkers 15th Annual Show between 10am & 4pm. The event will be in the same location as last year: Old Bethpage Village Fairgrounds, 1303 Round Swamp Road, Exit 48 on the LIE. There are door prizes, raffles, demonstrations, gift shopping opportunities, vendors and, of course, the star of the show: a 9,000 square foot exhibit hall filled to the brim with fabulous pieces of furniture & decorative art. Yours truly will have 15 pieces on display. I haven't been updating this site as often as I would like but I have been updating my Truffuls Page on Facebook with pieces I'm working on and new creative endeavors to allow me to stay creative even when my back won't let me toss a tree around. Please "Like" my page and share it with your Facebook friends. The picture here is of just 6 pieces that I was working on at the same time. I've gotten a lot of interest in the piece I made for my son's 30th birthday and that will be on display as well as the three "Voices" pieces and a few other items. I'll also be turning new pieces at the show both days. I plan to be turning a real crowd-pleaser: Box Elder! I have a few logs of it and will be cutting up turning blanks tomorrow to take with me. Everyone loves to see the red streaks and the kids love to toss the wood shavings around and get splashed with water from the wet wood. Once the show is over I'll be added new pieces to the site, I've got several in the works right now. I hope to see you all at the show! Comments
Two New Items Hit the Gallery! Published On 08-27-2010 , 12:17 PM I'm getting dizzy trying to keep up with production. I've got more pieces coming soon but for now I give you "Mulberry Swirl" and "Midnight Oak Blossom". I've mentioned the mulberry piece here before. It was the first piece turned on my new Stubby Lathe. It's been tossed around my shop for almost 2 years waiting for some inspiration. There was a large bark inclusion on the rim that popped out and I wasn't happy with the way it looked. A Symposium session with Sharon Doughtie gave me the idea I was looking for. I grabbed a cutting wheel and sliced a long spiral down the entire piece, reshaping the ugly void. The slice was further carved to give the illusion of one side slipping under the other. The inside had moved quite a bit, leaving ridges on the grown rings. I loved how it felt so I used a rough sanding mop on the outside to remove some of the softer growth rings, in effect "raising" the harder rings. I love turning endgrain! It feels very earthy and begs to be held. The piece has a bit of burl & birdseye here and there and the chatoyance makes it glow. The color reminded me of ancient gold. To emphasize this I put a tiny amount of gold micro-holographic dust in with the wipe-on poly. She stands a proud 7.25" tall. Now we move from a rich ancient gold find to a mysterious midnight surprise! This is another piece that got kicked around the workshop for almost 2 years waiting for me to finish it. Every year at the Long Island Woodworkers show we have a vendor come with a portable saw mill. I grabbed this piece of "scrap" from their cast off pile while no one was looking and turned it at the show, much to the delight of the onlookers. The inside or top of the bowl showcases the quarter sawn flecks coveted by furniture makers. It really gives life to the piece and denotes a swirling pattern. This led me to the swirling patten carved on the bottom. After finishing the swirls I scalloped the rim to carry the carving to the edge. The bottom has been ebonized with a torch, then airbrushed with blues, greens, violets, reds & magenta to give a dark opalescent appearance. A small amount of micro-holographic dust was added to give a mysterious luster to the piece. The icing on the cake is the spectacular 12mm Swarovski Crystal Volcano "Rivoli" (at left) set in a recess at the center of the "blossom". This dark mysterious piece is full of surprises! Hop over to the Gallery to see more photos on the above pieces. So, "what does 500 pounds of wood look like" you ask? My wonderful son collected all this for me! He was leaving an apt. complex and spotted this broken cherry tree that the county had already cut up. The tallest piece on the right is the cherry. It comes up to my chest. The rest of the larger wood is all walnut and a few crotches of pin oak that my son got from one of his customers. He had to leave a lot behind as his work van was full and the larger pieces were several hundred pounds each! I've already turned an endgrain walnut dish that is resting in a bag of wood chips and I have another slice of the trunk you see up on the saw horse to make a matching shallow bowl. It is supposed to be a great weekend so I should have more treasures to show you all next week. Comments
A Weekend of Regeneration! Published On 08-23-2010 , 1:38 PM Finally I can let the proverbial cat out of the bag! "Regeneration" started out as a $7 discount bin block of dried out spalted maple. It was meant to be a warm up piece to get me back in the grove after a 14 month recovery period from my last spinal surgery. I posted a few "in progress" shots to my twitter feed and my son said he loved it. His 30th birthday was approaching so I pressed on with the project. Silly boy forgets that he's not 100% Irish, but I gave him a woodburned Celtic ring on the bottom anyway! Around the rim I mounted 30 peridots in gold settings. I deliberately drilled all the way through the rim so there would be gold dots on the inside of the bowl. The title "Regeneration" eludes to my determination to get back into the woodshop and his progress through his own generation. I teased him throughout the process by posting 1" shots of different parts of the bowl. I delivered his gift to him on August 20th. Upon looking at another new piece of mine my darling boy commented "You never stop taking my breath away!". I have the greatest son on the planet! <3 I hope I can continue to earn that! Hop over to the Portfolio to check out the detail shots! We had a fabulous weekend but it was way too short! My boy presented me with several blocks of wood from a woodworkers store he discovered near his work route and roughly 500 pounds of fresh Cherry, Walnut & pin oak. Gave me great traction on the way home with all that dead weight in the back! How I'll find time to get to all of it I'll never know. The mass exodus of retirees from work is really making me bitter. I seem to be suffering from a "mid-life" crisis. I feel trapped in a job with no future, everyone is running either scared or for the hills. I'd give anything to be able to leave this place and do my artwork full time. I feel like I'm running out of time, the calendar is speeding up & my heart and soul is left trampled and dusty at the door to my job. The only time I'm blissfully happy is when I'm in my woodshop with the music cranked up and up to my head in woodchips. I dreamed a few weeks back that I moved to Florida to help my mom care for my dad and I rented a shop. I had a beautiful gallery in the front and my dad and I puttered in the woodshop happily all day. Even my son & grandson moved down with me. It was a perfect life, until I woke up... What a roller coaster, eh? Comments (1)
AAW August Website Contest Winner Published On 08-17-2010 , 10:29 AM Time to toot my own horn again! My piece "Neighbors" won the August 2010 Website Contest over at AAW. The contest was for a platter/plate that allowed the wood to be the star. This is one of the most amazing pieces of wood I ever came across. The level of chatoyance is really captivating. My piece will be featured in the October American Woodturner Journal. Comments (2)
The Voices have spoken Published On 08-16-2010 , 8:02 AM The third and, sadly, last piece of wood from the Voice of a Beloved Tree project are done. The Potter's Voice is 5"W x 5"H and the walls are 1/8" thick. I was shooting for a sphere but Mother Nature said "No". So far she hasn't steered me wrong. As this shape emerged I recalled seeing an ancient piece of pottery in the same shape. As with the others in this series, I felt as though I was listening to the tree recall memories and those memories helped shape the final pieces. I had a lot of fun with this series and am sorry to see it end. I had a very productive weekend in the shop, working on 3 projects. The first being the final Voice piece and on two pieces that had been sitting in my shop for quite a while waiting for inspiration. The first one is from this post on my blog about the first piece I turned on my Stubby lathe. This mulberry vase had a large bark inclusion at the top that flew out while turning. I just didn't like the void it left behind so I put it aside until I had a plan. After the AAW Symposium this past June I had the inspiration to grab a cutting wheel and slice a large spiral down the piece. I had left the vase pretty thick so I had enough wood to make it look like one side of the vase would slip under the other side. This piece was turned on end grain so I used a very aggressive sanding mop to create a sand-blasted surface. Sand blasting digs out the softer summer growth in effect raising the harder winter growth rings. I'm in the process of finishing this piece so look for it soon in the gallery. The third piece I worked on this weekend is another piece that has been languishing waiting for an idea. It is a natural edge shallow bowl made from a scrap of white oak. I turned it during a live demo at the 2008 Long Island Woodworkers show. We have a crew that brings a portable saw mill and trees. I grabbed this piece off the scrap heap. I left this piece thick as well thinking I'd play with a bit of carving. I'll be using a dramatic finish for this and am eager to see how it turns out. Several other little pieces are waiting for finishing. I'm hoping to have a dozen or more pieces in this year's show. Look for more pieces to hit the web soon! Comments (2)