Thinking of Utah Woodturning Symposium - pics from 2004

The 2004 Utah Woodturning Symposium was the 25th Anniversary of the event. I was very fortunate to have been invited to demonstrate for this event, because all of the demonstrators for the 25 year history were invited to submit two pieces for a major retrospective exhibit at the Brigham Young Art Museum. There was also a book produced called, "Beneath the Bark - 25 years of woodturning." I had two pieces selected for the exhibit and book.

I have way too many pictures to post here, but I'll touch on some highlights and focus more on the demonstrators that were able to attend.


Jean Francois Escoulen demonstrated his offcenter turning techniques and spindle work.













Jacques Vesery talked about how he makes his canvas and he demonstrated his carving/pyrography and coloring techniques.












Mike Kaplan came over from South Africa and talked about turning in South Africa as well as demonstrating his forms and surface enhancement techniques. It was so good to have Mike and Grant Marshall over for the first time.















The instant gallery was amazing in 2004. Most of the previous demonstrators brought examples of their signature work - wow, what a fantastic exhibit of eye candy.

Here are the pieces I had in the instant gallery for 2004.














Here are some of Mike Kaplan's pieces. I have a few examples of Mike's work in my private collection. I love the textures and shapes he uses.










J. Paul Fennell's work is always stunning.


















I finally met Brenda Behrans. I love her hand carved vessels. She uses a Japanese carving technique to good effect here.
















Hans Weissflog's work is also always amazing.














These classic natural edge forms were done by Jerry Kermode.
















Allan Batty and Stuart Batty's work


















Joshua Salesin's mandela cups. Ornamental turning at its best. I have a couple of these in my collection, too.












Malcolm Tibbett has the biggest imagination I've seen. This sculpture has several bottomless segmented bowls assembled into a wave form.
















I always enjoy seeing Jim Christiansen's work, too. He's an amazing carver and sculpture. He'll be demonstrating at the Utah Symposium for the first time this year.















Here's the sign for the museum exhibit. The opening reception was on Thursday evening.












And here are my pieces hanging out with Jean Francois Escoulen's, Betty Scarpino's, Brenda Behren's, Guilio Marcelogelo's and Mike Kaplan's. Mine are in the upper right corner.














We had a book signing on the opening night of the exhibit. I sat with Art Liestman and we had a good time signing and giving everyone a hard time. I smiled so much that evening my cheeks were sore the next day. What a blast!










Part of the fun of the Utah Symposium is the interaction in the hallways in between rotations. Here are Terry Martin from Australia and Graeme Priddle from New Zealand checking out digital images and talking about an article Graeme was preparing for Turning Points, which is edited by Terry.







Friday night is the big BBQ and swap meet. Bonnie Klein and I were minding our own business when Jacques Vesery came up to us and said, "sign my arm, baby." So, we did.









Here I am with my South African friends, Mike Kaplan and Grant Marshall. Grant and Mike did some wonderful rotations, and it was great to have them here in 2004.











Art Liestman and I entered the egg cup race, but our goal was to go for the longest time. We certainly took enough of it - about 4 hours to complete our piece. We had a lot of fun with this one.









At the closing ceremonies, all the demonstrators line up at the front. Rollie Munro (New Zealand) decided that he had to have a tatoo like Jacques Vesery's, and so I had to sign his arm, too.










We had all signed a picture for Dale Nish - one of him demonstrating at the first symposium. It was presented by Albert LeCoff and Mike Mahoney.










Allan Batty gave a little speech about how much the symposium has meant to him. His health hasn't been great lately, so he thought it might have been his last visit to the states. Fortunately, that was premature and we've seen him back to Utah each year since then.






We had a wonderful banquet for all the demonstrators in attendance for the 25th anniversary. Here's Allan Batty with Art Liestman and his wife, Jan. Allan sat down to tell us stories and jokes.









Dale Nish stopped to slip a few of his own into the conversation.












Allan and Stuart Batty. Father and son, and I have no idea which of them is the worst flirt.














Allan is very hugable, though.














Eli Aviserra was here from Israel.

















Joe O'Neill from Ireland. Joe and I always talk about Irish Music. I brought my fiddle to play tunes for him during the 2005 symposium.













David Nittman and Cindy Drozda.

















Richard Raffan.














Mike Mahoney and me.













Dick Sing and Gorst duPleissis. Dick and Cindy Sing always host some evening gatherings in their hotel room, which is always fun. Gorst does some amazing rose engine work, and he lives in New Orleans. His house and shop took a huge hit last year during hurricane Katrina.








And, here are the trouble makers of the 2004 symposium. Jacques started it. . .

Thinking of Utah Woodturning Symposium - pics from 2003

Next week is the Utah Woodturning Symposium, which is the longest running one in the USA. I went to my first one in 2003. I was invited to demonstrate in 2004, which was the 25th anniversary of the symposium. I also attended last year and I'm flying out on Wednesday to make it to my fourth consecutive year. It's a wonderful symposium with an excellent line up of demonstrators. This year the focus seems to be on turners from the UK, which should be a lot of fun.

I took a lot of pictures at each of the symposia, too many for a single posting, so I'll post this in three parts for 2003, 2004, and 2005. Here are some highlights from 2003:



This is me with Dale Nish at the Craft Supplies pre-symposium event. Most of the symposium attendees arrive a day early to take advantage of the sales and the demos that go on all day, which feature the symposium demonstrators. It's a good way to get an extra day of rotations in, and everyone has a good time catching up on the year. Dale started the Utah symposium way back when.





Here's Dale Nish with my good friend, Art Liestman. Art is wearing one of his custom designed T-shirts with the "dancing man" script from the Sherlock Holmes novel. The T-shirt translates to: "Andi is a babe." Not really - it says: "Dances with lathes." I'm still waiting for my "Andi is a babe" T-shirt.







Here is one of Dale Nish's wormy ash vessels.


















Trent Bosch did some demos at the Craft Supplies event. He was demonstrating carving techniques for adding enhancement to functional bowls.















Trent does a lot of teaching and has his bread and butter functional work, but he's also doing some interesting mixed media sculptural work. These pieces represent his family, usually in groupings of two to five. I've really enjoyed watching the progression of his wood and bronze sculptures.














Phil Irons also did some demos at the pre-symposium show. Phil is a giant of a man - the tallest woodturner I've ever met. He's originally from Australia (note the hat. . .), lived in South Africa, where he met his wife, and now he resides in the UK.









See what I mean about Phil being tall? I'm not a short person by any stretch of the imagination and he towers over me. I get a kick out of Phil giving Bonnie Klein a hug - he just lifts her several feet off the ground while giving her a bear hug.














The Craft Supplies day also involves an on-site bar-b-que. Everyone scrambles for a seat and a place in line. I think I've only gone to the bbq the first year I attended. Since then I've gone to a local hamburger joint down the road with my friend J. Paul Fennell and the rest of the cohort from the Phoenix group.













Joe Fleming is from San Diego, and one of my oldest friends from the World of Woodturning group. He didn't seem to mind the bbq fare. . .

Speaking of San Diego Woodturners, Mike Mahoney started his turning career with that group. Mike has a pre-symposium gathering at his place each year and the San Diego group always goes as do the demonstrators for the symposium, and an assorted group of others, including previous demonstrators. I went to the gathering that night and had a good time. Mike's house is on top of a hill overlooking the valley leading up to the Wasatch Mountains.






Mike's a production turner who sells his work wholesale - lots and lots and lots of salad bowls. He rough turns them from green wood and then seasons the bowls in a basement "bowl room." Here's an example of the way he dries his bowls. He told me that his stock was way down at the moment I took the picture.







Ok, so here are some pics from the actual symposium (aside from the instant gallery pics I already showed of works by Dale Nish and Trent Bosch).




David Nittmann demonstrated how he did his basket illusion vessels and platters. David does not need to use a microphone when he demonstrates. I found that to be very impressive.









David does beautiful designs that look like woven baskets. He uses pyrography and transparent colors for his illusion effects.















Stephen Hughes is from Australia and demonstrated some wonderful techniques for making his amazing boxes. I had some time to get to know Stephen when I was in Australia last fall. See the October and November 2005 archives for more information on that trip.













Here is an example of the amazing boxes that Stephen makes. Unless you see him do a demonstration, you walk away from this scratching your head and mumbling, "how'd he do that?"











Michael Werner also did a couple of rotations. This one was on inside out turnings.













Here are some examples of Michael Werner's inside out turnings.













Here's the display of J. Paul Fennell's and my work in the instant gallery.

















Winged bowls done by Stuart Batty.














Another tradition of the Utah Symposium is the evening egg cup race - usually in teams of two. Noble (can't remember his last name) asked me to team up with him to do the race. I was totally clueless here, but had a good time anyway. We didn't win. . .









Here are some of the WoWies that made it to Utah in 2003. I can't remember who some of them were, but J. Paul Fennell and Art Liestman are standing next to me and Joe Fleming is on the far right.









Art Liestman and Graeme Priddle (from New Zealand) at one of our evening dinners.












The final reception at Kip Christiansen's house. Art Liestman, Andi Wolfe, and J. Paul Fennell.

What's this???? I spy a squeaky toy.














Yes, it's a confirmed sighting. It is, indeed, a squeaky toy.














Give it to me, please. Give it to me! It's mine!














I will shred it to pieces after I eat the squeaker out from the inside. Yummmmmmmm. Squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak . . ..










No, don't take it from me. I'm safe here under the table. It's mine, all mine, mine! Squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak . . . .

Collaboration with Keith Tompkins - Part I

Keith Tompkins sent me a lidded vessel and these two cone shaped things to play with. He wanted a carved oak leaf motif for the finials. Here's the start of my end of the project. The only major challenge with this is the wood. It's rock hard maple and it's a bear to carve.








After laying out the leaf outline with pencil, I did the roughout using a variety of hogging out burrs with the Foredom tool. My hands go numb after an hour of this, and I'm glad this part of the project is done. This and the next pic give you an idea of how the roughout proceeds.









There's a drill hole most of the way through the cone section. The walls are pretty thick.












The roughout is done and this gives an idea of how the finial will be composed.

Whetstone Park of Roses

The rose garden at Whetstone is in the peak of blooming now. It was pretty spectacular this morning - the first morning with sunshine we've had in a few days. The past couple of days we've had torrential rainstorms, and the river had risen quite a bit along the path where we usually walk. We avoided the shoreline today, and I'm glad we did because when we got a little farther down the bike path the water was up nearly to the edge and you could see where the river had overrun the bank and moved some logs onto the path.



There was still a lot of moisture on the flowers this morning. I really like walking through the rose garden and the perennial garden at Whetstone. I'm glad to be able to enjoy these plants without having to be the one to tend to them.














I don't pay much attention to the cultivar names. It's enough for me to enjoy the color and shape of the flowers. Some of them have wonderful scents as well - especially the heritage roses in the upper section of the garden. The tea hybrids aren't nearly as nice in terms of their scent, but they make up for it with their shape and color.







I like the muti-hued ones a lot.

Exine series

Ok, so here is the finished project. Ambrosia Maple; 4.25 X 3 inches.

Dennis guessed correctly from my photo title in the preview post. This is an exploration of microscopic motifs. In this case it is the pollen grain wall at very high magnification, which is where the name "exine" comes from.






I've always been attracted to SEM images of seeds and pollen as it relates to species identity and phylogenetic relationships. When you look at pollen grains at high magnification you see all sorts of architectural structures - columns and rails and a virtual honeycomb of a skeleton.I didn't realize how much work this would be in the carving!

Bad timing for rain

Aisling was supposed to play at the Columbus Arts Festival tonight, but we had some big thunderstorms roll in about dinner time and the organizers cancelled everything for tonight. One can understand that with all the lightning and torrential rains, but we were looking forward to playing this evening. Oh well, I suppose it works out the way it's supposed to sometimes. I couldn't do much in the shop this evening with the basement collecting water. My shop suffers everytime we have heavy rains - all due to a former owner's idea to have an automated sprinkler system housed from the basement. Steve cut all the pipes off when we had the basement redone, but now the water wicks in and drips down the wall during big storms. He's going to have to dig out the pipes from outside and fix this problem (pretty, pretty please?).