Vintage Views are nostalgic views of early carving projects of a carving journey begun around 1975 as a budding hobby rekindling childhood memories of whittling as a playful activity of creative exercises of imagination.  Many of these early projects were done in a casual schedule of spontaneous inspiration in a slow methodical process of learning while doing by shaping a block of wood with a knife. Many have not been seen in public other than at “show and tell” at carving club meetings and reflect early attempts of doing the best one could do at the time with the level of skill and design reflective of growing with experience.

The projects depicted in this gallery represent carving projects that were carved between 2000 and 2010.

An interpretation of an Ivan Denton carving.

Santa sitting on a tree trunk carving a Santa.

Abraham Lincoln four inches tall.

An interpretative study of Abraham Lincoln is another example of carving a subject several times to illustrate that “Practice makes Progress.” Even though a subject may be carved several times, yet each one will have a personality of its own. Carving the same subject several times is not the making of a “copy” but is the making of another interpretation of the subject.

The “Flat Sleeping Dog” idea was first seen in as a whittled carving in a gift shop in Berea, Kentucky in the mid 1970’s and was filed away in this carver’s imagination as a fun carving project and was eventually carved.  Over the years numerous flat sleeping dogs in various sizes have been carved as a fun project. Let sleeping dogs lie and lying dogs sleep.

The Walnut American Eagle carving at the top of the photo views were carved with the help of bent carving knives that were made from two prong meat forks cut in half to make two bent knives from each meat fork.  The photo below is of those four knives that were used along with other knives to carve the eagle.