Whittle Folk Monks are carved from a three inch by one inch square block of basswood making the face approximately three quarters of an inch long and a half of an inch wide.  The face is proportioned using the Rule of Three for face proportions with one third from hairline to eyebrows, one third from eyebrows to bottom of nose and one third from bottom of nose to bottom of chin. Whittle Folk Monks are carved only with a knife with slicing cuts and hard line cuts creating shadows to enhance the detail and simulate movement.  Each face is carved to take on a personality of its own as is depicted in the photographic Face Study below. Read the rest of this entry »

Randy True of Selma, Indiana is known for his Native American decorative carvings.  Recently he has expanded his carving activity to include carving wooden handles of knives using Native American themes.  Most of the time he carves on the cherry wooden handles of the Helvie brand of knives.  He can custom design a handle and blade cover for the customer as he did for me in the following photographs.  He also offers for sale Helvie Knives that he has already carved or he can carve on a knife the customer provides. Read the rest of this entry »

“A Long Knife Pirate,” was the title of a posting on this web log on June 18, 2009.  That pirate has now been painted using the Painting Softly method.  This pirate was Whittle-Carved using only the knife that appears in the photographs as an illustration of how versatile the scimitar blade shape is for carving in nooks and crannies where another blade shape would not be as efficient. Read the rest of this entry »

Eleven students participated in a two day class in Whittle-Carving on July 11 and 12, 2009 at Gorman Farm, an educational-learning farm in Cincinnati, Ohio.  All the students had big smiles on their faces indicating that they enjoyed a fun time together learning to carve three inch tall Whittle Folk Monks using only a knife to carve these small figures.

Participants are left to right in the front row: Don Potter, Pat Scott, Jim Cable, Ed Stover, and back row left to right: Tom Denton, Rick Eskins, Mickey Huston, Barry Pennington, Ferd Kruetzkamp, Dick Middleton and Rob Witzke. Read the rest of this entry »

Adair Rucker and his wife Patty of Lockhart, Texas teach carving, wood burning, scrimshaw and Sculpey clay modeling of carving subjects.  They taught a class in sculpturing with Sculpey clay at the recent International Woodcarving Congress in Bettendorf, Iowa.

I have known the Ruckers since 1995 when we were together in the War Eagle Seminars.  It was there that I first noticed the practical and unique “Lap Box Apron” being used by several carvers from the Texas and Arkansas area.  Such a neat idea and easy to construct using a shallow wooden box and a shop apron tacked to the inside of the box.  Studying the photograph gives a self explained procedure on how to make one’s own “Lap Box Apron” to take to wood carving meetings, carving classes or doing some relaxed carving under the shade tree.

Visit the Rucker’s website at http://www.christmascarvingsetc.com/ and if you ever have a chance to take one of their classes, it would be well worth the investment.  Adair and Patty are fun people to be around and they are very knowledgeable in what they teach.

Fred Cogelow receives Best of Show honors for his carving of a young lad sitting on a log while reading a book.  Fred was also one of the instructors during Congress week of seminars. Read the rest of this entry »