Connecticut Art and Garden Tour

My work is light to the touch and dazzling to the eye: lathe turned vessels sculpted from local, found hardwoods. I extend the boundaries of the wood medium with thin wall piercing, dyes, airbrushing and a dramatic, color saturated, high gloss finish. A perfect marriage of the natural properties of wood with my modern, irreverent artistic vision

Artist's Statement

I describe myself as a studio woodturner: I’ve been a woodworker all my adult life (some sixty years). I formerly built musical instruments and furniture. My work sculptural lathe turned vessels from green wood, found locally. Closed (hollow) and open (vases, bowls) forms. The green turning allows thinly turned vessels to shift into pleasing distortions as they dry, this movement occurring in lieu of cracking or checking as with dimension lumber. Features include a variety of rim treatments (carving, burning air brush paint), thin wall piercings and my signature dyed, high gloss ‘electric guitar’ finish. This involves intense surface dying with a built up clear coat resulting in a visually ‘deep’ surface, high reflection index and dramatic display of the grain and other natural features of the wood. Often mistaken for glass, ceramic or metal because of the unexpected color saturated finish, but distinct from these media because of the relative ‘weightlessness’ and lightness to the touch.