More and more, carving seems to me an 'inner game'.

I often think that I only do a few 'things' - let's call it 5 - when I carve. These are not so much techniques as attitudes that I have; focuses; ways of working.

It's hard to overemphasize how profound these things feel to me sometimes. I mention them to students ("Here's a pearl. Catch!") but I'm never really sure if they get it since I also understand how banal or drippy these things must sound.
Anyway, judge for yourself.

Here's the third:

It's that song: "The leg bone's connected to the thigh bone; the thigh bone's connected to the hip bone..." etc.

Consider this: Your cutting edge is the finest, sharpest tip of a wedge.

When you push it through the wood fibres, your cutting edge is followed by the bevel.
And this is followed by the blade.
And the blade is connected to the handle, and the handle is connected to your hand and - feel free to sing along but I warn you it doesn't scan well - to your arm... your body... down through your feet to the floor.

So you really are carving from the floor!
We can even throw in Newton's Law about action and reaction: without the floor you to push against you wouldn't make a mark on that wood!

I am really talking about several things, different 'floors'.

How we physically carve:

Many beginners stand too close up to their carving. Whenever you can, stand a little way from it and lean into, and even onto, your work. You'll see quite small people pushing a gouge through hard wood quite efficiently when they use their body weight correctly.

In addition to putting your body weight behind your cut, keep your elbows in to your body and move your body around to follow the tool by shifting your weight between legs.
Keeping your elbows into your body like this drastically reduces stress on your elbows.

(Although, yes, I do advocate standing to carve, it becomes less important with smaller projects. If you literally cannot stand to carve, then no doubt you realise you've lost the benefits of a flexible and adaptable standing posture, will be used to adapting to your circumstances and have found many a 'work around'. Still, think about the principles here and how you might 'carve from your chair' etc.)

How we mentally and emotionally carve:

To get the full picture of what is happening, you have to add other dimensions to all that physical connectivity: the lighting, temperature, sounds and smells in the workshop; how you are feeling (engaged or bored; happy or angry); your focus or restlessness of mind - all that stuff - and you cannot help but be directly connected with it!

You could think of this as a sort of 'inner floor'.

Something that has intrigued me since I started carving, and is true of all and every activity, is the complete yet changing nature of what 'we' are in any moment, expressed in what 'we' are doing in that moment.
This is so obvious if you look that I am cannot be said to be making any airy-fairy or mystical observation.
On the other hand it's only apparent if you look! Otherwise we just smoothly and dream-like pass from moment-to-moment, minute-to-minute, hour-to-hour through our lives.

It's extremely important to anyone, including we who aspire to carve!
Why?

If you look closely at your difficulties with carving (or anything else for that matter) almost all of them come down to this mental and emotional side of things, the attitudes we take, the choices we make and the energy and motivation we can gather, rather than the sheer physical problems of carving. (The answers to issues like 'not enough time to practise', 'can't sharpen', 'never know what to carve' etc will be led by mental and emotional changes and choices.)
It's working with this inner reality that separates one carver from another as much as anything they do physically.

And the crunch is that improving your carving, or carving anything (or even carving at all!) is a matter of working more with this part of our connectivity than the physical - usually more so.
I'm tempted to give you examples but it's better to ask you simple to consider and look for yourself.
And if you don't - if you choose not to - well, there's my point!  

That's it!

Please forward this newsletter to a woodcarving friend, and anyone else you think might be interested. Thanks!

Joy and success with your carving.

                                                              Chris Pye  

 
PS: One for the Bench:

"Remember then that there is only one important time, and that time is now. The most important one is always the one you are with. And the most important thing is to do good for the one who is standing at your side. For these, my dear boy, are the answers to what is most important in this world. This is why we are here."

           ~ final words, Leo, the wise Turtle. The Three Questions: based on a story by Leo Tolstoy, Jon J. Muth, writer & illustrator, Scholastic Press, NY, 2002, unpaginated.

BACK ISSUES of this newsletter:

http://www.chrispye-woodcarving.com/intro/pastnews.html
including zipfiles for 2001 - 2006 text-style newsletters

TUITION/TEACHING 2007/8

UK (1-TO-1 PERSONAL TUITION)

The best way to learn or improve your carving is to join me in my studio for intensive, custom tuition, tailored to exactly what you need. Easy to arrange; dates to suit.
Full details here:
http://www.chrispye-woodcarving.com/tuition/t_custom.html
 

USA 2008 (Center For Furniture Craftsmanship, Maine)

  July 21 - 25:  Relief Carving

  July 28 - Aug 8:  2 week Intermediate/Advanced

Details later in the year on the CFC website: http://www.woodschool.org

SLIPSTONES WOODCARVING MANUALS

Help yourself!
You are free to copy any or all of these ebooks, send them to your carving friends, or have them available on your own website but you must not charge money for them.

Full list and details here:
http://www.chrispye-woodcarving.com/slipstones/index.html