Snow and Turning Do Not Mix

Sorry about not getting more turning done and up for you to read. Winter has hit with a vengeance. I am tired of shoveling. Normally I step out my front door to some brickwork. Now I step out to snow and ice. In the spring, summer, fall I can back up to where the door is just about hitting the car to bring in groceries and stuff. Actually I could easily get it to where the door hit the car but what would be the point? Look at this.

Yep. That mess to the left of the shovel is about 20 feet from the house and left by the plow to block the path. No anger at the plowman. He has to put the stuff somewhere. Part of it he put in the front of the path to the shop. It is a good forty feet. Used to be thirty but the snow had to go somewhere. I have shoveled the paths at least 3 times today and some of the snow I carried 20 feet by the shovel full to have a place to dump it. The whole province (Nova Scotia) seems about the same.

I miss my lathe. I miss the shop. I miss the time to turn. However, enough complaining. Spring is around the corner. The snow will go and I can retire the snow shovel for the duration. Wood will be found and turning will go on. Back soon with wood.

Really, It's All About the Wood - And the Friends

Some new pages on the great shop clean are up.

As I was cleaning through the shelves, a long and reflective happening, I came across a bunch of flat pieces. Some of these were small sections of well grained log that should make decorative plates. Others were pieces that I will likely use for glue plates and the like. Some I will possibly thread as faceplates. Regardless, these are all hardwood sections and now well dried. These would come at a cost as there are more than a few board feet here.

I was reflecting on how good it is to have friends and how fortunate I am. I buy very little wood. Most of this came from friends who were going to dispose of it somehow and thought to call. Some others came simply because friends who cut firewood for a living found too nice a piece to be burnt and thought of me. Big or small, the thoughtfulness makes it worth a lot.

More Cleaning, More Wood, It's Coming Along

 I am continually amazed at the amount of wood we throw out in the province of Nova Scotia every year. The great stuff that get burned as firewood is at least firewood but still there is a great deal of wastage. I once watched a pallet mill make some bird's eye into pallets for shipping because that was the next wood in line. They would not let me buy the wood or the pallets.

As I continue to clean up the shop I continue to come across gems in the woodpile. Some of it is beautiful wood while other pieces teach me about the wood itself, how it moves and cracks and adjusts. We are privileged to play with such wonderful material.

I have found a super hoard on the next shelf as the clean up goes on.

There is everything from butternut to maple to ash and even some basswood to carve. Too bad I have to wait to use it until I am finished the great clean.

craft thoughts

Phyllis George, founder of the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft and an avid folk and traditional arts collector said:
“Crafts make us feel rooted, give us a sense of belonging and connect us with our history. Our ancestors used to create these crafts out of necessity, and now we do them for fun, to make money and to express ourselves.”

One of the threatening philosophies in our culture today seems to be an attempt to rewrite history. While history is the domain, generally, of the victors and is told always from a biased viewpoint no matter how objective the writer attempts to be, it is still an attempt to present facts as well as interpretation. Crafts have always been a part of our history no matter where we are in the world.

At first craft was done from necessity. People needed weapons for defense and implements for hunting, fishing and gathering. Later farm tools were needed as well as tools for various other crafts that developed. Homes and furniture were needed as well.

Then as things got more settled and urgency for the finished product diminished to allow for more production time, art got confused with craft as decorative work was added. The history of craft is also the history of art especially as it affects the things that people use every day.

Today the effects of the industrial revolution allow us even greater freedom for art in craft as most utensils, furniture, wood work and fabric can be readily produced as a consumer item by machine. The craftsman woodturner? Following for instance the bowl turners of yesterday we may still attempt to craft a fine salad bowl out of beautiful woods. Yet the person buying could get as functional a bowl for less than a tenth the price at the local big box store.

Instead, we all become a part of the ongoing history of craft. The turner makes a bowl for the sheer joy of crafting a piece out of wood in the same manner as turners a thousand years ago. The buyer buys not for the salad, but for the pleasure of using a beautiful object on a regular basis. They purchase not a salad bowl but a gorgeous piece of wood lovingly crafted in the manner of a long history of craft and civilization.