Art, Craft, Vessels, Weedpots, and Materials
Lobby Dosser
on the use of materials and so on. What started this was a picture of
what appeared to me to be four weedpots in the Readers Gallery of the
Jan/Feb Fine Woodworking. These "poplar vessels" are completely black
with the exception of some "ribbons and dots of white acrylic sheeting to
create a sharp distinction between artificial materials and natural
elements". The poplar was flame treated because it "provides a rich,
warm, black tone that can be difficult to achieve with stains or dyes".
1. Art - interesting, but - to me - not spectacular.
2. Craft - look well formed, very slim (3.5" by 15"), consistent, and the
acrylic work must take some real effort.
3. Weedpots - all four have what appear to be weeds in them. When does a
weedpot become a vessel?
4. Materials - the picture is quite small (2.5"square - including the
weeds) and might not show the wood properly, but it certainly looks like
they could have been created in glass, pottery, or even acrylic. Brass
might be good, as brass can be chemically blackened quite easily. Very
difficult to see any distinction between artificial materials and natural
"elements".
So, why use wood? Is it just a canvas? Why tell anyone what material was
used for the canvas? If it is intended as multi-media, does the object
lose something if you can't tell one media from another?
Did Michelangelo paint his sculptures?
George
"Lobby Dosser" <lobby.dos...@verizon.net> wrote in message
news:4GZEf.2075$H43.547@trnddc08...
> 1. Art - interesting, but - to me - not spectacular.
That's two votes for interesting.
> 2. Craft - look well formed, very slim (3.5" by 15"), consistent, and the
> acrylic work must take some real effort.
So's a "Welcome Friends" duck, but none on my door.
> 3. Weedpots - all four have what appear to be weeds in them. When does a
> weedpot become a vessel?
When it has capacity to hold something, I guess. Weed pots are just form
with a hole. Note that the "form" can be as beautiful as anything "hollowed
to 1/8" wall thickness" and you haven't noticed.
> 4. Materials - the picture is quite small (2.5"square - including the
> weeds) and might not show the wood properly, but it certainly looks like
> they could have been created in glass, pottery, or even acrylic. Brass
> might be good, as brass can be chemically blackened quite easily. Very
> difficult to see any distinction between artificial materials and natural
> "elements".
With a lot of "art," there's more in pretentious prose than in the piece
itself, that's for sure. They didn't publish the "artist's statement,"
though.
>
> So, why use wood? Is it just a canvas? Why tell anyone what material was
> used for the canvas? If it is intended as multi-media, does the object
> lose something if you can't tell one media from another?
>
> Did Michelangelo paint his sculptures?
>
Greeks and Egyptians sure did. I believe Mike got hot under the collar
about mis-attribution and "signed" the Pieta, though.
rthn...@yahoo.com
Lobby wrote:
> 1. Art - interesting, but - to me - not spectacular
Wouldn't that depend on the piece of art? There are some pretty
spectacular carvings, oil paintings, glass sculptures, etc. out there.
> 3. Weedpots - all four have what appear to be weeds in them. When does a
> weedpot become a vessel?
When you take the weeds out.
> 4. Materials - the picture is quite small (2.5"square - including the
> weeds) and might not show the wood properly, but it certainly looks like
> they could have been created in glass, pottery, or even acrylic. Brass
> might be good, as brass can be chemically blackened quite easily. Very
> difficult to see any distinction between artificial materials and natural
> "elements".
> So, why use wood? Is it just a canvas? Why tell anyone what material was
> used for the canvas? If it is intended as multi-media, does the object
> lose something if you can't tell one media from another?
I used to ask that same question, then I looked at some awesome
pottery, glass and metal pieces that were also "enhanced" to where you
would ask "why use glass?" or "why use pottery?" I guess the answer is
"why not?" if that's the medium you enjoy working with and can create
something beautiful. If you like to eat potatoes, don't you fix them
in a variety of ways rather than only enjoying them mashed or (in my
case) raw?
I learned that if you do your craft the same way all the time, you're a
production worker. If you are creative and do a variety of items in
your medium or expand by combining materials, you are the subject of a
lot of posts on forums! : ) This is a good thread.
Darrell Feltmate
>2. Craft - look well formed, very slim (3.5" by 15"), consistent, and the
acrylic work must take some real effort.
Craftsmanship is craftsmanship and necessary, at least in my reactionary
mind, for good artistry.
>3. Weedpots - all four have what appear to be weeds in them. When does a
weedpot become a vessel?
A weedpot is a vessel, but so is a bowl, a vase, a box, a something that is
able to hold something. The question is rather when is a vessel a bowl, a
hollow form, a weed pot, a ...
>4. Materials - the picture is quite small (2.5"square - including the
weeds) and might not show the wood properly, but it certainly looks like
they could have been created in glass, pottery, or even acrylic. Brass
might be good, as brass can be chemically blackened quite easily. Very
difficult to see any distinction between artificial materials and natural
"elements".
>So, why use wood? Is it just a canvas? Why tell anyone what material was
used for the canvas? If it is intended as multi-media, does the object
lose something if you can't tell one media from another?
I guess I would ask, "why not use wood?" If I wanted to paint something I
would use and have used wood. While I could stretch a canvas I am next to
useless as far as making pottery or brass items to paint and my
understanding is that the preparation for such materials is more complicated
than wood. A potter or brass worker would likely disagree but I am more
familiar with wood. It is also in the family af a long tradition. Many of
the old masters used wood for a painting backing. Even the Mona Lisa is
painted on a small piece of poplar.
>Did Michelangelo paint his sculptures?
As much as I admire his work, what is the relevance of the question?
Besides, the man was originally a fine stone worker and he covered the fine
stone work of the Sistine Chapel with magnificent painting.
A very nice set of questions. Thanks Lobby.
--
God bless and safe turning
Darrell Feltmate
Truro, NS Canada
www.aroundthewoods.com
Chuck
Hi Ruth,
>> 3. Weedpots - all four have what appear to be weeds in them. When does a
>> weedpot become a vessel?
>
>When you take the weeds out.
Haha...so by that reckoning, when you put weeds _in_ it, does a Ming
"vaahwz" become a weedpot?
>I used to ask that same question, then I looked at some awesome
>pottery, glass and metal pieces that were also "enhanced" to where you
>would ask "why use glass?" or "why use pottery?" I guess the answer is
>"why not?" if that's the medium you enjoy working with and can create
>something beautiful. If you like to eat potatoes, don't you fix them
>in a variety of ways rather than only enjoying them mashed or (in my
>case) raw?
Does smack a bit of snobbery, doesn't it? I heard a recent
illustration that if one likes coffee but drinks it sweet and light
that they don't really like _coffee_. Pshaw...that's like saying if
you must actually season it, then you don't really like any food.
Mmmm, eggs with no salt or pepper.... : * P
--
Chuck *#:^)
chaz3913(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
Anti-spam sig: please remove "NO SPAM" from e-mail address to reply.
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questions'. "Please Sir, I want more."
Hi Ruth, Another of your usual perceptive and sensible posts. Thanks.
I won't upset a Steelers Fan by calling at 6:30 pm EST tomorrow to thank
you for the CL-TL cup. Regardless of which team wins it won't be Titans
or Dolphins :(. A proper Woodturner--Football Nut will raise one of your
great CL-TL cups to both teams. I'm testing mine with Lorraine's coffee
even as I type. :)
Coffee or distilled malt, whether from Tarje' or Neiman-Marcus, just
tastes better in your cups, even if you don't turn them from wood. :)
Proper protocol also requires corking the bottle with a SSNiles stopper.
If too late for some, they can buy now and "just wait til next year!"
Turn to Safety, Arch
Fortiter
nailsh...@aol.com
>> 3. Weedpots - all four have what appear to be weeds in them. When does a
>> weedpot become a vessel?
>When you take the weeds out.
Please let me know when you are gonna fire of one of those gems. I am
now cleaning coffee off my monitor... but it was worth it. In my
mind's eye I am seeing a conversation with Charlie Chan and Number One
son. That was great. Kinda sums it all up, doesn't it?
Whenever these art vs. craft discussions start, it usually boils down
to this: an unresolved discussion of what >you< like compared to what
>I< like. Especially in an informal setting like this.
And in my understanding of art and of craft, that is really all there
is to it. You like it, or you don't. You appreciate the effort, or
you don't. You understand the learning curve and dedication needed to
achieve certain results, or you don't. You appreciate the imagination
it took to use certain materials, produce certain shapes, or combine
certain techniques or you don't.
Many times what appears to be snobbery on the part of some folks is
just that. On the other hand, it is also a reflection of their lack of
respect for those that think out of the box, and certainly shows a lack
of appreciation for the use of imagination (and acceptance of same).
Lobby Dosser wrote:
>>So, why use wood? Is it just a canvas? <<
Absolutely. I have told people for years that wood to me is just Play
Dough. Turning is such a tiny, tiny aspect of woodwork. As a
remodeling contractor and carpenter, I build walls with it, trim out
houses with it, build cabinets with it, build decks, jungle gyms,
jewelry boxes, work tables, coffee tables, lamps, earrings, lamps,
custom cabinets, desks, stairways, toys for my nephew, step stools for
my older relatives, and on and on. Lots of rough work and lots of
finish work for all manner of purposes.
I think that many times the people involved in one aspect of any hobby
think that as they grow proficient that their aspect is of some
importance to all. Our woodturning group is average size, with about
20 people attending every meeting. Sometimes more, rarely less. Yet,
this make up only .0015 % of our city's population. BTW, we are city
of 1.3 million, so not a tiny town. In my book, .0015% of anything
isn't much.
Yet many in our group are strangely dismissive of those that don't get
the "art" or "craft" of what we do. Safe to say about another 99.9% of
our general population?
Yet we have the "purists" in our little band that finish only with a
beeswax/tung mixture, and are ready to dismiss all else. They only
turn bowls, cups, small platters and vases. They might turn a piece to
put on a bottle stopper, or make a pen or something at Christmas, but
they don't want to admit they used a kit to make anything, and would
prefer not to admit they did anything so pedestrian. And better to
turn a boring piece that looks like everyone else's than to get too far
out there in the realm of imagination.
Then there is the other camp that sees wood differently. We burn it,
stain it, drill it, fill it, sand it, paint it, dye it, cut it, grind
it, chip it, texture it, segment it, gold leaf it, carve it and weave
gizmos onto it. Some of the pieces don't look like wood anymore when
these guys are finished. Why does this bother some people? I wonder.
When they passed around the cabernet dyed curly maple platter with gold
leaf grapes in the middle, some of the old guard could get it passed on
fast enough. It was gorgeous, yet all they saw was that someone had
the gall to stain curly maple. They didn't get the gold leaf at all.
To me, wood is just a medium to work in. Sometimes it is wonderful to
enhance the wood by showing off the aspects we find pleasing like
keeping burly areas on a desktop. Sometimes it is good to have great
weather resistant woods to use as siding to be painted on our shops.
And sometimes it is nice to have clean, straight material to carve
spoons, make a cutting board or new bunk beds. Wood is a God given
material, a gift really, to be used as we see fit. To me, that's
pretty much all there is to it.
FWIW, I wholehearted agree with Ruth, Darrell, and Chuck.
Robert
Lobby Dosser
>
> "Lobby Dosser" <lobby.dos...@verizon.net> wrote in message
> news:4GZEf.2075$H43.547@trnddc08...
>> 1. Art - interesting, but - to me - not spectacular.
>
> That's two votes for interesting.
>
>> 2. Craft - look well formed, very slim (3.5" by 15"), consistent, and
>> the acrylic work must take some real effort.
>
> So's a "Welcome Friends" duck, but none on my door.
When I was a child, my mother always kept 3 ceramic flying ducks on the
living room wall. You know the kind, they get smaller as they fly up the
wall. Since then I have been very averse to 'art' or 'craft' in the shape
of any fowl.
>
>> 3. Weedpots - all four have what appear to be weeds in them. When
>> does a weedpot become a vessel?
>
> When it has capacity to hold something, I guess. Weed pots are just
> form with a hole. Note that the "form" can be as beautiful as
> anything "hollowed to 1/8" wall thickness" and you haven't noticed.
I suspect the objects in question are indeed hollowed.
>
>> 4. Materials - the picture is quite small (2.5"square - including the
>> weeds) and might not show the wood properly, but it certainly looks
>> like they could have been created in glass, pottery, or even acrylic.
>> Brass might be good, as brass can be chemically blackened quite
>> easily. Very difficult to see any distinction between artificial
>> materials and natural "elements".
>
> With a lot of "art," there's more in pretentious prose than in the
> piece itself, that's for sure. They didn't publish the "artist's
> statement," though.
I'm not sure they didn't publish his statement. I think artists - or
their agents - put out press releases just like any other business. The
text reads somewhat like a press release.
>
>>
>> So, why use wood? Is it just a canvas? Why tell anyone what material
>> was used for the canvas? If it is intended as multi-media, does the
>> object lose something if you can't tell one media from another?
>>
>> Did Michelangelo paint his sculptures?
>>
>
> Greeks and Egyptians sure did.
And its a shame we never got to see them in their original state. Imagine
all those blank eyeballs with pupils and irises painted on!
> I believe Mike got hot under the
> collar about mis-attribution and "signed" the Pieta, though.
Do you know if he had a grind named after him? After all, he did use
chisels.
>
>
>
Lobby Dosser
>
> Lobby wrote:
>> 1. Art - interesting, but - to me - not spectacular
>
> Wouldn't that depend on the piece of art? There are some pretty
> spectacular carvings, oil paintings, glass sculptures, etc. out there.
I meant just this work. And, in fact, I kind of like the piece on the far
left. Got a less contrived look to it.
>
>> 3. Weedpots - all four have what appear to be weeds in them. When
>> does a weedpot become a vessel?
>
> When you take the weeds out.
Thanks Ruth, at least that's cleared up! :o)
>
>> 4. Materials - the picture is quite small (2.5"square - including the
>> weeds) and might not show the wood properly, but it certainly looks
>> like they could have been created in glass, pottery, or even acrylic.
>> Brass might be good, as brass can be chemically blackened quite
>> easily. Very difficult to see any distinction between artificial
>> materials and natural "elements".
>> So, why use wood? Is it just a canvas? Why tell anyone what material
>> was used for the canvas? If it is intended as multi-media, does the
>> object lose something if you can't tell one media from another?
>
> I used to ask that same question, then I looked at some awesome
> pottery, glass and metal pieces that were also "enhanced" to where you
> would ask "why use glass?" or "why use pottery?" I guess the answer
> is "why not?" if that's the medium you enjoy working with and can
> create something beautiful. If you like to eat potatoes, don't you
> fix them in a variety of ways rather than only enjoying them mashed or
> (in my case) raw?
Raw potatos?! Boiled, fried, mashed, scalloped, and a rather odd deep
fried with fluff inner I had 40 some years ago in a restaurant in Paris.
I was halfway down the path to 'medium you enjoy working in'. Could also
be the medium you learned first and the techniques you mastered. If you
want to broaden your horizons, perhaps you want to do so in a manner that
uses your existing skills. But, the wood then becomes the 'canvas' and is
it still 'woodturning'?
>
> I learned that if you do your craft the same way all the time, you're
> a production worker. If you are creative and do a variety of items in
> your medium or expand by combining materials, you are the subject of a
> lot of posts on forums! : ) This is a good thread.
Good. Let's set the cat among the pigeons. I'm going to suggest that a
woodturner has crossed the boundary beetween craft and art when she
throws away as much as she sells and doesn't include an explanation of
how the object was finished.
>
> Ruth
> www.torne-lignum.com
>
>
Lobby Dosser
> Ruth Niles wrote:
>
>>> 3. Weedpots - all four have what appear to be weeds in them. When
>>> does a weedpot become a vessel?
>
>
>>When you take the weeds out.
>
> Please let me know when you are gonna fire of one of those gems. I am
> now cleaning coffee off my monitor... but it was worth it. In my
> mind's eye I am seeing a conversation with Charlie Chan and Number One
> son. That was great. Kinda sums it all up, doesn't it?
>
> Whenever these art vs. craft discussions start, it usually boils down
> to this: an unresolved discussion of what >you< like compared to what
>>I< like. Especially in an informal setting like this.
>
> And in my understanding of art and of craft, that is really all there
> is to it. You like it, or you don't. You appreciate the effort, or
> you don't. You understand the learning curve and dedication needed to
> achieve certain results, or you don't. You appreciate the imagination
> it took to use certain materials, produce certain shapes, or combine
> certain techniques or you don't.
I hope I didn't imply that I didn't appreciate what had been done. In
fact, I think that one component of Art is that it raises questions.
>
> Many times what appears to be snobbery on the part of some folks is
> just that. On the other hand, it is also a reflection of their lack
> of respect for those that think out of the box, and certainly shows a
> lack of appreciation for the use of imagination (and acceptance of
> same).
>
> Lobby Dosser wrote:
>
>>>So, why use wood? Is it just a canvas? <<
>
> Absolutely. I have told people for years that wood to me is just Play
> Dough. Turning is such a tiny, tiny aspect of woodwork. As a
> remodeling contractor and carpenter, I build walls with it, trim out
> houses with it, build cabinets with it, build decks, jungle gyms,
> jewelry boxes, work tables, coffee tables, lamps, earrings, lamps,
> custom cabinets, desks, stairways, toys for my nephew, step stools for
> my older relatives, and on and on. Lots of rough work and lots of
> finish work for all manner of purposes.
Well, it is a good material with many functional and non functional uses.
IIRC, virtually all Russian Icons are painted on wood so the wood in that
case is literally a 'canvas'. There are other examples. The Byrdcliffe
group of the Arts and Crafts movement did a lot of landscape or still
life painting on their cabinets.
[Good stuff snipped.]
>
> Then there is the other camp that sees wood differently. We burn it,
> stain it, drill it, fill it, sand it, paint it, dye it, cut it, grind
> it, chip it, texture it, segment it, gold leaf it, carve it and weave
> gizmos onto it. Some of the pieces don't look like wood anymore when
> these guys are finished. Why does this bother some people? I wonder.
> When they passed around the cabernet dyed curly maple platter with
> gold leaf grapes in the middle, some of the old guard could get it
> passed on fast enough. It was gorgeous, yet all they saw was that
> someone had the gall to stain curly maple.
How could the artist live with the Shame?!
I have to admit that I would see staining of good curly maple as an
abomination. :o) But hey, it's your wood and if you want to put a coat of
outdoor latex on it go right ahead. Speaking of which, you can sometimes
find some great buys hiding under paint. Once bought a painted dresser
for $5.00. When I got the paint off it turned out to be birds eye maple.
Lobby Dosser
>>1. Art - interesting, but - to me - not spectacular.
> Sure, but there is a lot of art that is not spectacular.
>
>>2. Craft - look well formed, very slim (3.5" by 15"), consistent, and
>>the
> acrylic work must take some real effort.
> Craftsmanship is craftsmanship and necessary, at least in my
> reactionary mind, for good artistry.
I don't see that as reactionary. Just common sense.
Sometimes ruminants just aren't responsible for what they come up with.
George
>
> Well, it is a good material with many functional and non functional uses.
> IIRC, virtually all Russian Icons are painted on wood so the wood in that
> case is literally a 'canvas'. There are other examples. The Byrdcliffe
> group of the Arts and Crafts movement did a lot of landscape or still
> life painting on their cabinets.
They're on wood because they were normally painted on panels in a wooden
iconostasis which was torn up when the church was trashed by the Turks or
the Reds.
What has survived are a pitiful remnant of an immense amount of art that
decorated many churches. Take it from one who still makes the sign of the
cross in the "wrong" direction, iconostases often consisted of hundreds of
paintings.
Casper
gone back to read it upon occasion. I reposted it for your reading and
remembering pleasure. eNjOy!
>Darrell Feltmate was heard to mutter on 2/4/2006 9:54 AM: