LearnCarving1PDF.pdf

http://www.chrispye-woodcarving.com :

Dedicated to the teaching, learning, and love of woodcarving

Slipstones Woodcarving Workshop Manuals

LEARNING TO CARVE – 1

Successful woodcarving depends on a mix of aptitude, knowledge and skill.

Knowledge and skill can make even a little ability go a long way!

What’s the best way to make the most of what we have, and go about learning to carve?

Read on...

Contents

1: Introduction

2: A Skill

3: Desire

4: Demands

5: Talent

6: What is possible?

7: Right Conditions

8: Intelligent Learning

9: Systematic Practice

10: Summary

The writing here is my personal relection based on contacts with a large number of students and

carvers over many years.

Feel free to use, copy, print and distribute this ebook, unchanged and for no cost.

http://www.chrispye-woodcarving.com :

Dedicated to the teaching, learning, and love of woodcarving

Slipstones Woodcarving Workshop Manuals

LEARNING TO CARVE – 1

Learn to Carve with Chris Pye...

1: Introduction

Woodcarving is a most astounding craft.

On the one hand is the timeless decorative incising of treen or woodware. On the other the

breathe-snatching lowers and feathers of Grinling Gibbons.

Woodcarving includes the Christian igurative sculpture of Renaissance Germany; the Buddhas

of 13th century Kamakura Japan; African tribal gods; the sculpture of Barlach and Henry Moore;

lettering and wildlife; furniture and architecture - and so much more.

The roots of woodcarving go back through time, in afiliation with stone, to Greece, Egypt - to who

knows where. Yet at its simplest woodcarving can happen when you sharpen your pencil with a

penknife.

Committed woodcarvers know how self-absorbing this craft can be; how ‘therapeutic’ the

concentration; how utterly simple it is compared with

hi-technology; how nothing is hidden.

Everything happens in and by your own hand.

Simple lettering:

Getting one good “0” is not so

much the problem as getting

three the same!

So, how do you learn to carve? Where do you start? What do you need to know?

I have been asked many questions along these lines for as long as I have been carving. And other

questions about being ‘artistic’ enough or practical enough; about how much natural talent is

required; about secret tips and tricks to learning, and so on.

What follows is drawn from my observations of what students imagine and expect, my replies and

advice.

These thoughts may sound a little blunt and not the list of do’s and don’t you might be looking for,

but if you want to learn to carve - and carve well - start here.

I start with a premise :

http://www.chrispye-woodcarving.com :

Dedicated to the teaching, learning, and love of woodcarving

Slipstones Woodcarving Workshop Manuals

LEARNING TO CARVE – 1

Learn to Carve with Chris Pye...

2: A Skill

Woodcarving is, at its root, a skill.

It has other, vital, skills built into it: the sharpening of tools; the handling of cutting edges; the

ability to see in three dimensions, designing with wood in mind, and so on.

But it is a skill and, as such, can be learned, as any other skill.

If you start here - leaving the magic and mystery

to one side for the moment - then what you want

to do is learn woodcarving skills.

Learn woodcarving skills, then apply them to

whatever ideas and subjects you like.

You can of course do the two things

simultaneously.

Success in any skill depends on a mix of aptitude,

knowledge and practice.

Think how you learned to drive a car, type, or play

the guitar for example.

Really do this now.

Consider how you learned these or any other

skills...

Where did you begin?

http://www.chrispye-woodcarving.com :

Dedicated to the teaching, learning, and love of woodcarving

Slipstones Woodcarving Workshop Manuals

LEARNING TO CARVE – 1

Learn to Carve with Chris Pye...

3: Desire

When you considered how you learned to drive, for example, where did you start? What did you

see as the beginning?

The beginning must have been that you wanted to learn to drive. Similarly you must want to learn

woodcarving.

But surely we agree you want to learn - after all that’s why you are reading this.

Yes, but the crunch, right at the beginning, is to realise that it is the emotions that start us going,

that drive us. We are energised by gut desires - not simple head-wishes.

Many beginners have a

head fantasy of learning

to carve but really have no

idea of hard work it might

take to realise this simple

wish. Especially if they want

to carve well , as we all do

- to the best of what we are

capable.

We need the energy of

emotion, the will, the

passion , to overcome

obstacles and frustrations,

to keep us hanging in when

our patience has run out.

Additionally it will be the

emotions that reward us :

the physical pleasure of

cutting with sharp tools,

the sounds and smells; the

joy of creativity, of making

something beautiful where

there was nothing before.

And there are untold

rewards to be had...

We need this strong emotional engagement because success in carving, or any skill, will

make many demands of us.

http://www.chrispye-woodcarving.com :

Dedicated to the teaching, learning, and love of woodcarving

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