Maori Woodcarving

I have had a long term interest in Maori woodcarving, with its intricate surface designs and powerful imagery.

I recently travelled in New Zealand and used the opportunity to research the design and carving techniques used in Maori carving. Traditionally Maori carvers used bone, shell and stone tools, but my visit to The New Zealand Arts and Crafts Institute (college for the teaching of Maori crafts such as Woodcarving and Weaving) demonstrated the high quality training and use of modern tools. The carver I chatted to was using Swiss made chisels, gouges, fluters and veiners. Sharpening was done using oil stones, slipstones. Drills and coping saws were in use along side these tools. Not so different from my own tool bag!!

Maori carving varies and includes simple forms, two dimensional and three dimensional forms decorated with complex and often fine surface patterning. Totara is the most commonly carved wood (lime is its equivalent in the UK), chosen for its ease of carving, even texture and hardwearing nature.

 

The carving process is similar to that in the UK, drawing and modelling designs. Transferring designs onto wood and roughing out, refining, then carving the fine detail and finishing. Some Maori carvers use machinery, others do not. The use of power tool inevitably looses something gained by direct touch and feel, and cannot create the sharpness of direct cuts with a gouge or chisel.

 

Maori designs can be abstract or human forms. Decoration is added as spirals, scrolls, notches, pyramids and thumbnails and combinations of these. I have always like the thumbnail cuts used and was interested to look at their production with veiners and gouges.

 

Traditional Maori designs follow the traditions of tribes, but the design elements and principles can be adapted with endless variation and is being developed and used by contemporary carvers.

Contemporary designs combine the best of traditional techniques and modern imagery.

Shain Whateran is one of the many successful contemporary sculptors.

Necklace Pendants

I have just started to produce some lovely, very individual, necklace pendants in Thuya Burr and finished with Danish oil. They are hung on a 60cm necklace made from waxed cotton cord. Each of the designs shown here is priced at £20.

Please email me if you are interested in finding out more about them or purchasing one.

Lioness Sculpture – research and process

One of my favourite pieces is my Eagles Head which captures a wild moment in the angle of the head and the savagery of the beak. It is a contemporary piece which has been hollowed out from within. This enhances the impact of light and shade, especially through the pierced eyes.

Now I want to use these ideas when carving the head of a lioness. So where to start? I visited Liverpool’s World Museum and spent the morning drawing lioness skulls.

Then I developed my ideas drawing lioness heads, linking the external appearance with the underlying bone structure. I wanted to capture the savagery of a snarl based on lifelike representation which has been stylised.

Before starting to carve I still needed to get the shape firmly in my head, so I made a model of the lioness head in plasticine, gradually forming the head from a block. Fundamentally it is a different process because when modelling you can add and remove pieces of plasticine, but with carving you can only remove material. However it still helps to define the shape clearly in my mind. I gradually formed a head remembering to capture the snarl and keeping the eyes of the predator forwards.

My first attempt looked more like a Staffordshire Bull Terrier, so I remodelled it several times more until it became more cat like, then like a big cat. The shape of the nose and ears developed. During the process I was lucky enough to have a day carving with the sculptor Michael Painter. He helped me advising on how to set the eyes in, shape the brow and position the ears.

After several more remodelling sessions it has started to take on the form I had in my mind. Ways of stylising it into a more contemporary form are growing in my mind. Soon I will be able to start carving the lovely air dried block of cherry tree which is tucked away in a black bin bag in my shed.