Santa jewelry pins are carved as a flat relief out of  quarter inch thick bass wood that is about an inch and a quarter wide, kinda like a yard stick without the numbers printed on it.  Each is carved using a knife.  The head covering is carved first so that when the head is carved it will fit into the hat.  The length is determined by how long of a beard the Santa will have, (making each Santa pin between an inch and a quarter to an inch and a half long).  Read the rest of this entry »

Apple wood is a very beautiful wood that is considered to be a hard wood but it is not as hard as cherry, maple or walnut.   Its rich color without distinct grain pattern makes it suitable to carve jewelry pieces.  Since the grain composition is very tight one can carve intricate details without those details crumbling, splitting or breaking at crucial design junctures.  The carvings depicted in the photo were carved between 1978 and 1981.  Each was carved with a knife while those with textured backgrounds were textured with an awl or ice pick kind of tool. Read the rest of this entry »

The carvings depicted in the photo trail are some of my earliest carvings carved between 1976 and 1979 while I was a member of the Mahoning Valley Wood Carvers of Warren, Ohio.  The club was founded in 1976 by about twenty carvers with the most notable being the late Huber King who had won Best of Show at the International Wood Carvers Congress, Davenport, Iowa several times in the late 70’s.  Read the rest of this entry »

Whittle Folk Gothic were carved around 1990 – 1991 and these five are all that remain from that era.   The inspiriation for these Whittle Folk Gothic came from the famous painting entitled “American Gothic” by Grant Wood.  Each was carved from a three quarter inch by at least three inches tall block of basswood and finished natural using Deft semi gloss clear wood finish (a brushing lacquer).  These “Gothic” figures were an attempt to carve realistic figures in a small scale of the whittle-carving style of carving only with a knife.  Read the rest of this entry »

WHITTLE FOLK ‘POKES are carvings done in a Western theme.  Each one, except for the miniature and the bust, were carved out of a three quarter inch square by four inch tall basswood block using only a knife and in particular just the tip end of the blade using a slicing cut. Read the rest of this entry »

These Whittle Folk Geezers are Five Gentlemen Geezers whose tall and stately stature give them the distinction of being respected for what they have experienced in life.

Each is carved out of a one inch square by five inch tall block of bass wood and are colored with artist oil paint mixed with boiled linseed oil.  Whittle Folk are carved only with a knife using an “exaggerated realism” style.  Read the rest of this entry »

The WOOD BEE CARVER has discovered over the years of carving a creative tension that is both “agony” and “ecstasy.”  Experiencing this tension almost every time with any new carving project led me to come up with the following rule: “CARVING IS AGONY AND ECSTASY, BUT ECSTASY ALWAYS FOLLOWS THE AGONY .”

Because wood carving is a “learn by and while doing” and one’s subconscious is at work in the creative process, there is a certain amount of tension (as in  the stretching of a rubber band and an inner power as the rubber band is released and returns to its former state) and in this tension there is a certain inner power at work.  This creative tension can be called the “agony and ecstasy” of the carving process.  Read the rest of this entry »