These are my entries into the 2009 Caricature Carvers of America mail-in competition August 27 in Converse, Indiana. I have been entering carvings into competition since 1978 both as mail-in and as part of being a carving show participant.  It is a good experience that every carver should do as an extension of the carving experience.

While encouraging carvers to both participate in wood carving shows and entering one’s carvings into competition, I often offer some of my thoughts about competition and judging.

The most important thought is: “The only person you are competing with is yourself.” By this I mean that allowing the judges to evaluate your carvings is to see how you are doing and growing as a carver based upon an objective evaluation of the judges.  Even though there are many other carvings in a particular class, yet each carving is evaluated on its own merit and not compared with the others.  Thus the ribbons awarded does not mean the one is better than the other, but each particular carving was evaluated to the level of the placement of the ribbon.  A carving not receiving a ribbon may indicate more study and practice to improve the next carving project.

Another thought: “Never expect to win and never expect to lose but always expect to be surprised.” Sometime the carving thought to be a sure winner does not even receive a ribbon and other times the carving entered as a fluke does better than the “sure winner.” Always expect to be surprised.

Another thought: “Always enter pieces into competition if nothing more than to give the judges something to do.” This is part of the surprise element but also the more pieces that the judges have to evaluate, the more the judges are stimulated to do their very best evaluations.  And the more carvings in competition the better the show, so do not be shy about entering carvings in competition.

Another thought: “In every show there are at least five carvings (maybe more) that could be considered ‘Best of Show’ so appreciate the ones chosen and the ones that could have been.”

Another thought: “Be a humble winner and a gracious loser and most importantly do not take it all so seriously, enter for  fun and self improvement.”

Another thought:”Don’t ask for judge’s critique if you do not want to hear the evaluation.” Most judges want to be instructional and helpful but do not want or need  arguments.  We carvers have worked so closely with the carving project seeing it through our creative eyes based upon our interpretation.  The judges looks at the same carving project from the distance of observation and sees the carving with different eyes.  Sometimes we carvers need to observe more than we see.

Another thought: “Enter carvings in several competitions for mixed results or confirmed evaluations.”

Another thought: “Competing is only one phase of the carving journey while the real fun is the carving process, so get busy carving for the next round of competitions.”

Below are close up views of each piece that was entered into competition at CCA.

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HONORED BY THE JUDGES – as an update on the competition entries below are the carvings that were recipients of the judges recognition as can be seen in the following photographs.  There were over one hundred eighty entries so I was very honored  by the judges’ evaluation at the August 27, 2009 Caricature Carvers of America Competition.