Maine Wood Concepts, a maker of custom wood turnings, wooden tool handles and other custom molded wooden parts, is the manufacturer of the official 2018 White House Easter Eggs, which will be sold by The White House Historical Association (WHHA).
 
The wooden eggs will be given as gifts to children attending the White House Easter Egg Roll on Monday, April 2, 2018. The eggs will also be available for purchase as individuals or as a five-egg set while supplies last.
 
Four eggs feature the Great Seal and are available in yellow, green, blue and pink. The fifth egg is gold and features the Presidential Seal. All eggs feature the signatures of President Trump and the First Lady. The four individual eggs retail for $8.50, the golden egg retails for $14.95, and the five-egg set retails for $34.95.
 
Maine Wood Concepts says it is not allowed to talk to media about anything regarding the eggs through a contractual confidentiality clause. Company President Doug Fletcher wrote on LinkedIn: “Many would be surprised to learn that Maine Wood Concepts, parent company of Fletchers’ Mill and the Lutz File & Tool Company, does much more than manufacture world-class gourmet cooking tools and file handles.”
 
For eight of the past 11 years, Maine Wood Concepts competitor Wells Wood Turning and Finishing made the official eggs, turning out 18,000 for last year’s roll.

The annual roll began in 1878, when President Rutherford B. Hayes agreed to open the White House grounds on Easter Monday to children who wanted to roll Easter eggs. Music played by the United States Marine Band is also a highlight of the event, beginning in 1889 by President Benjamin Harrison, according to the WHHA.
 
Since then, it has become a tradition, occurring every year except for during World War I and a 12-year hiatus following World War II.
 
Maine Wood Concepts is a manufacturer of sustainably-harvested custom wood turnings, wood tool handles and custom molded wooden parts. The company makes wood parts, custom wood dowels, wood handles, wood toy parts, wood wheels, and wood furniture parts.

 

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An unlikely class at Madison’s West High School is seeing success thanks to a local partnership.

For five years the Badger Woodurners have partnered with West High School to teach students how to turn wood on a lathe.

As a chapter of the American Association of Woodturners, the Badger Woodturners work to advance the art and craft of woodturning. That’s why you’ll find the club’s lathes inside the school’s shop room.

“This is a piece of a tree with bark still on it and I’m going to make a bowl. I think that’s really cool,” said West High School student Lily Sandholm.

Each day Badger Woodturning members volunteer up to six hours of their time to work with the school’s four classes. In a six-week program dedicated to woodturning, students learn the basics of rounding and tapering square wood.

“It’s programs like this that really teach kids to think. To problem solve. That’s what woodturning is all about,” said Badger Woodturner Dave Hiller.

Hiller said their teaching students to take a vision in their head, and turn it into a final product.

The school’s woodshop teacher Jim VanFossen said the class has seen huge success. In 2018 more than 300 students signed-up for the woodshop class. The class now has a waiting list to join at the entry level.

VanFossen also said he has had two student take their education in the woodturning class and turn it into a career.

“You go to an English class and you say ‘Oh, I wrote a paper,’ but in this class you come home say, ‘Oh look, I made this bowl. This is what I did,'” said Sandholm.

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Will Arcularius and Brent Arnold are an unlikely set of woodcrafters. More than 50 years of age separate the two, one is retired and the other is home-schooled.

Arcularius is President of the Southern Utah Woodturners Club and Arnold is into computer-aided drafting, playing the cello, and creating woodturning and technique videos on his own YouTube page. They do have one thing in common. Both share a passion for fine wood, a flair for turning old, discarded pieces into artful forms and a talent in woodturning.

Arnold, age 16, and the youngest member of the local wood turners club, began to fashion small wooden sculptures with a basic set of carving tools and a pocketknife his mom purchased for him when he was 8 years old. Carving became a keen interest for Arnold when he joined the Utah Valley Woodcarvers group in Orem, and met silver-haired seniors who enjoyed it as a favorite pasttime.

“I went home from those first few meetings and started to carve for hours at a time.”  Those early projects earned him merit badges with his Cub (Boy) Scout Troup, by etching an Indian Head, animal shapes or decorative ornaments. It wasn’t until his move to Cedar City in 2015 that an avid interest in all things wood evolved into much more.

“I was really sad when I had to leave all of those friends in Orem” said Arnold, “But when I went to register for high school classes here, I met the woodshop teacher, Mr. Thorley, who told me about the wood turning club. So I thought I would give it a try.”

That’s where Will Arcularius stepped in.

As a retired firefighter from Bishop, Calif., woodturning began with demonstrations and working with other guys on past-time projects. In 2009, after building a house in Enoch, and a roomy shop full of equipment, Arcularius opened the first meeting with 25 who had a passion for wood, an interest in sharing their work, and pursing more advanced skills and techniques.

The Woodturners have become both friends and mentors to Arnold. For his recent Eagle Scout project, Arnold turned wood finials to dress the top of the American, State and military branch flags for the Veterans of Foreign Wars, used for burials and ceremonies.

“We just didn’t expect this young man to walk into the club, or to see the talent he had already developed,” said Arcularius.  “But every once in awhile you run into a young person who is so focused and driven that they kind of stand out from the rest.”

The club space is a collection of lathes, band saws and wood-working tools and has become a hub for 75 members who enjoy turning a variety of wood scraps and salvaged pieces into useful and artful objects at weekly meetings.

Meanwhile, Arnold credits the club for introducing him to new techniques, the proper use of tools and what he needs to know about tool and equipment safety.  “We do all sorts of projects,” says Arnold of demonstrations, “that can be anything from working with bandsaws and laser equipment, to fashioning vases or candle holders using the lathe.”

Arcularius would like to see more youth take an interest in wood crafting and real-world learning projects.

“Members have a perfect opportunity to share their talents through demonstrations.  For young people, that can build self-confidence and improve public speaking skills, to better interact with people from another generation.”

Arnold organized his own home workshop. It is small by club comparison, but outfitted with a wide set of tools, donated by some members who hope Arnold will pursue his talent.  In the past year, Arnold has set up his own webpage, established a line of products on an Etsy shop site, and has continued to market his line of ornaments, birdhouses, pens, bracelets and candleholders or through techniques featured in weekly YouTube videos.

Both Arcularius and Arnold are avid wood buffs. Some of their favorite species:  Aspen, Mountain Mahogany, Catalpa, Big Leaf Maple, or burl pieces can sometimes be found as discarded, or at abandoned sites.

“We try to engage younger ones in a variety of practical skills,” said Arcularius of weekly projects.  “That might be working with electrical connections, repairing a screen, or helping to build a wheel-chair ramp.”

The process of rough woodturning is a lengthy one that requires a craftsman to wait anywhere from several months up to a year to a complete a final turn, a sealed and finished work:  so patience and diligent effort is part of the mindset.

“This young man can take this into a career or into a business,” said Arcularius, of youth who are commonly distracted by video games or with social media. “Working with wood, you learn real world skills, and how to live.”

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“It’s fun to see what Mother Nature has put into the wood,” Jerry Maly of Meadowlands tells us (my husband Art and me). And he is able to find the beauty in the wood as it sits in “chunk” form in his woodshop. Sometimes he’ll look at a chunk of wood many times before deciding what he wants to do with it. Carol, his wife of 54 years, shared that the bigger the challenge, the happier he is.

Jerry receives wood pieces from loggers, rescues some from the wood pile, and some arrive anonymously as dropped off pieces in his yard. Usually he finds out who donated it to him, but sometimes he doesn’t. He’s even been given old pilings which have been under the waters of Lake Superior for years.

When Jerry was attending Toivola-Meadowlands High School, he made a couple of wooden items and felt drawn to the art of woodturning. But through the years, working, raising a family, building a home, and farming took priority, and he didn’t have the time to work with a lathe or wood tools again until retirement. Sixteen years ago he began to work with wood once again, and many people have been the happy recipients of his artwork.

He does most of his turning during the colder months because “there’s always too much other stuff to do during the summer,” he said. Woodturning is a hobby that has become a small business for Jerry and Carol. They typically attend six shows each year to sell his handcrafted art.

 

Jerry belongs to a woodturning group in Duluth, as well as the National Woodturners Association. In both cases he’s gained ideas about how to work with the wood and items to create. At the Sax-Zim Birding Festival in Meadowlands recently, his table had everything from beautiful bowls, salt and pepper grinder combos, little boxes, purse holders, vases, kitchen items like ice cream scoops and bottle openers, and cute little snowmen and trees…all of them made with wood. He even created a clock with wooden gears that he had made of Baltic birch. It was his fourth clock of that type, each one distinctive, because “it’s more fun to be making something different.”

He showed us a bowl he made from a burl, or growth, on a tree and two of the smaller bowls made from the internal part of that burl. The smaller ones could nest inside the largest bowl, just as that wood had been inside the burl earlier. In addition to the beautiful grain of the tree, there was the rough bark left around the outside, adding even more interest to the piece.

Jerry enjoys working with pieces of wood that contain a crotch, where branches go off the main trunk, and we saw, in one of his turned bowls, the feathering appearance of where those branches had been.

It’s easy to see how fascinating woodworking can be with the various wood grains which come out as the wood is turned and from the many different species of wood that are available.

“I’d like to live another whole life so that I can do all the things I want to do,” Jerry said.

And we’d like another whole life so that we can see more of the creations that you and Mother Nature make together, Jerry.

 

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Members of the Central Illinois Woodturners, who are creating and donating the wig stands for female cancer survivors, write messages on the underside of each wig stand. These wig stands by Roger C. Alexander of Pekin wish recipients “Good Luck” and “Get Well.” PAUL SWIECH, THE PANTAGRAPH

 

 

Woodturners, NCHS students craft wig stands for cancer patients

“I’m not a believer that art you create is just for yourself,” said Jennifer Kelly, art teacher at Normal Community High School.

“Art is to be viewed by others,” Kelly said. “I want my students to know that their art can have an impact.”

As Kelly spoke during her Advanced Art Studio class on Feb. 13, students were busy painting and collaging wig stands. They will be donated to Central Illinois female cancer survivors who lose their hair as a side effect of chemotherapy to treat their cancer.

Among students was Kaylee Probst, an 18-year-old senior from Normal, painting her thumb different colors and then applying her thumbprint to a wig stand base, spindle and top to symbolize the uniqueness of each person’s cancer journey.

There was Sam Kortkamp, an 18-year-old senior from Bloomington, using Mod Podge to apply Wall Street Journal newspaper shreds to a wig stand to give it a “classy” look and to honor the intelligence of its future user.

And there was Sarah Leddick, an 18-year-old senior from Bloomington, painting flowers to symbolize beauty and the word “Strength” in pink as a nod to the strength of breast cancer survivors.

“I’m really proud of my kids,” Kelly said. “They are putting their hearts into this.”

The NCHS art students painting and collaging the 37 wig stands this month is the latest chapter in a story that began last spring when members of the Central Illinois Woodturners began creating and donating wig stands to female cancer survivors.

The woodturners donated 250 wig stands last year to the Susan G. Komen Memorial Affiliate, which distributed them throughout its 36-county service area that includes McLean County, and to Southern Illinois University School of Medicine in Springfield.

DeHarra Jones, 18, a senior in Jennifer Kelly’s art class, paints her wooden wig stand during class on Feb. 13 at Normal Community High School. DAVID PROEBER, THE PANTAGRAPH

 

Thirty-seven wig stands were created last month and shared with the NCHS students in a new partnership.

“They’ll be a lot more coming,” woodturner Mark Toon of Bloomington, said during a recent woodturners meeting at the Woodworkers Shop in Pekin.

“We hope to exceed last year’s count,” said woodturner and club president Roger L. Alexander of Bloomington.

“It has been amazing to see the responses, not only of the health care professionals, but from the patients who’ve received them,” said Gayle Young, mission director for the Komen Memorial Affiliate. “People have been moved that someone would take an artistic talent and use it to help others.”

Cancer patients receiving chemotherapy frequently lose their hair. Many women get wigs.

But most women don’t have anything special on which to store their wig when they aren’t wearing it.

“Some women have told us, ‘I didn’t know what to do with my wig. I was using an old milk jug,'” Young said.

Lisa Lowry, breast health navigator at the Community Cancer Center in Normal, said some women use Styrofoam heads.

Woodturner Terry Quiram became aware of this service gap and brought it to the attention of fellow members of the Central Illinois Woodturners.

Woodturning is a form of woodworking in which a lathe is used to make items that are generally round, such as bowls and vases. The group has about 60 members who meet monthly, alternating meetings between Bloomington and Pekin.

Creating and donating items wasn’t new to the group. But making wig stands for female cancer survivors resonated with the woodturners.

“We all have mothers and wives and daughters and sisters,” Alexander said. “It affects all of us.

“This is a chance for the club to give back to the community that supports us,” Alexander said.

A company in Chillicothe donates scrap wood. “It’s hard wood — maple, walnut, cherry and oak,” said woodturner Hod Bailey of Metamora.

Quiram cuts the wood and turns it into round pieces for the top and bottom and a square piece for the spindle. Then he turns each kit over to a club member.

Each club member puts each piece of wood on their lathe and turns it. Each piece is sanded, then covered with polyurethane.

Each woodturner creates each piece differently, so each piece is unique. In addition, club members put a message on the underside of each base.

For example, woodturner Roger C. Alexander of Pekin wrote “From Central Illinois Woodturners Club, Pekin & Bloomington, Good Luck” or “”Get Well” and then added his initials to the bottom of several wig stands he brought to the Feb. 12 meeting.

“It give us a chance to help somebody,” Roger C. Alexander said. “I’m a patient at SIU for cancer of the neck. It gives me a chance to help another cancer patient. I have a feeling for what they feel.”

Each wig stand takes three to five hours to create, Roger L. Alexander said.

While Roger C. Alexander has taken some of the stands to SIU in Springfield, most of them go to Komen in Peoria, which has distributed them to doctors’ offices and cancer centers throughout Central Illinois, Young said.

“For some women, losing their hair is a traumatic part of their breast cancer journey,” Young said. “This helps them to know that someone else is thinking about them.”

Some of the wig stands went to the cancer center in Normal, which has shared them with an oncology practice and with Bloomington salons that have wig banks.

“Any chemo puts you at risk for losing your hair,” Lowry said. “We are making them available to any female cancer survivor who loses her hair, not just breast cancer survivors.”

“It’s a nice way for women to store their wig,” Lowry said. “The patients have loved them. It’s artwork.”

But the woodturners heard that some cancer survivors preferred colorful stands. So Toon asked Kelly in January whether her art students would be interested in painting some stands. She said “yes”.

Students began working on the stands a couple of weeks ago and are finishing this week.

Kaylee Probst, in addition to painting thumbprints, is adding a quote from Theodore Roosevelt: “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.”

“I like it (the quote) because, in their (cancer) situation, having a hard time, they can still be doing something significant,” Probst said. “Their journey is so important.”

“I love this project,” Probst said. “I like the idea that we can share our art with someone else. We are impacting the community, not just ourselves.”

“This will raise the level of awareness of these students,” Young said.

Kelly said, “These kids will remember ‘Something of mine exists to help another person.'”

“When things happen that are out of your control, it’s nice to know that you’re not alone,” Kelly said.

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(Saint Paul, February 21, 2018)—The American Association of Woodturners (AAW) is pleased to announce that its Board of Directors has rededicated Woodturning FUNdamentals, AAW’s digital publication for new and beginning woodturners, and appointed John Kelsey as its new editor. The online periodical will continue to help newer turners build foundational woodturning expertise and skills, serving as an authoritative, practical, and pertinent guide to learning the art and craft of woodturning. The editorship of American Woodturner, AAW’s journal, remains unchanged.

Kelsey will produce four issues of Woodturning FUNdamentals during 2018. He succeeds Linda Ferber, who founded Woodturning FUNdamentals and served as its editor since its inception. The move frees critical AAW staff to concentrate on other initiatives and programming.

Kelsey, based in Pennsylvania, is a journalist specializing in crafts and design. In his long career he has been editor of Fine Woodworking magazine, editor and publisher at Cambium Press, and editorial director at Fox Chapel publishing. He has worked as a freelance writer, photographer, and editor since 1992, and is a founding member of the Lancaster Area Woodturners chapter of AAW.

“Linda Ferber led the way for AAW’s Woodturning FUNdamentals,” stated Joshua Friend, Editor of American Woodturner. “She saw a need and worked tirelessly to fill it, alongside her other roles within AAW. Her work ethic and dedication to AAW are remarkable and much appreciated. This move is about further aligning AAW publications with our mission and strategic plan. John Kelsey’s impressive experience in woodworking journalism is a boon; the AAW is extremely fortunate to have him.”

About AAW
The American Association of Woodturners (AAW) is a Minnesota nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization, headquartered in Saint Paul, dedicated to advancing the art and craft of woodturning worldwide by providing opportunities for education, information, and organization to those interested in turning wood. Established in 1986, AAW currently has nearly 16,000 members and a worldwide network of more than 350 local chapters representing professionals, amateurs, gallery owners, collectors, and wood/tool suppliers. The AAW possesses the single largest collection of woodturning information anywhere and its award-winning journal, American Woodturner is the foremost publication on the art and craft of woodturning in the world. To learn more, visit woodturner.org.

 

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Images
High resolution images may be downloaded at http://www.woodturner.org/?page=MediaKitFebruary2018

Contact
Kim Rymer
Marketing & Communications Director
651-484-9094
kim@woodturner.org

 

 

 

David (Dave) Charles has always loved working with his hands. Born in Southern California, Dave spent some time in Washington with the Navy. When he was through with his tour of duty, Dave was unable to find work in California and since he had married a woman from here, Priscilla, they decided to move to Thurston County. They have lived in Lacey for the past 16 years.

When he was in high school, Dave studied various art forms. As an adult, he has had a variety of jobs, including two years silversmithing. Other jobs have included being a carpenter, a rigger at a shipyard and even a golf course superintendent at a small golf course where he constructed buildings, took down trees and fixed the plumbing. “I really have always worked with my hands,” he says.

After a heart attack at 32-years-old left him medically retired, he became extremely bored. “Watching him not work was painful,” his daughter Melissa chimes in. “He was grumpy.”

“I reached a point that I was going nuts not having enough to do,” he says. “I was used to working long hours and I had been a laborer all my life. My father said, ‘I have this small lathe, do you want it?’ And I said, ‘Sure, I’ll try anything.’ So he brought it up and showed me the basics.” That was the summer of 2005. Since then, Dave has self-taught himself the amazing craft of woodturning.

For his own craft, Dave specializes in making things out of pieces of wood that others have discarded. “People give me pieces of wood that they don’t know what to do with and I make things out of them,” he says. “Like a sliver of wood that they can’t use, or maybe a piece that has some rot in it.” To use these pieces, he sometimes has to fix the rot while it’s turning. He does this by gluing shavings and sometimes coffee grounds with super glue into the wood as he turns the piece.

The other thing unique about Dave is that he doesn’t design. He lets the lathe create as he goes. “I put a piece of wood on the lathe and I know it’s going to be a bowl and that’s all I know,” he explains. “I don’t know what shape it’s going to be until I’m done. And it can change shape as it goes.”

Dave explains that each species of tree acts differently on the lathe and so does each individual tree, depending on the stresses it grew under. “The ripples in the wood are all affected by the stress and the age of the tree and how those stresses are put into the wood can affect how you get a product out of the wood,” he adds. “It will cause the wood to change shape differently than another tree grown right next to it. No two trees will ever be alike.”

He can make just about anything, and he does. From simple bowls and plates to goblets and Christmas ornaments. He also makes funerary urns. His wife has an amazing lighthouse he made for her. He has made birdhouses and even a hot air balloon (another one of his wife’s favorites). He also plays with turning Corian and has made ornaments, belles and spinning tops with it.

 

Creating a Piece of History

A fun part of Dave’s work is the history he is able to preserve. He often gets a piece of wood from a very old tree that he then gets to make into something that will last for generations. He just recently made some items out of a butternut tree that was brought into the state – it was certified as being around 125 years old.

“On occasion the state will contact the Woodturners of Olympia (WoO) saying either they have a tree down or they are taking down a tree and they ask us if we would like some of the wood,” says Dave. Some of the members of WoO then make gavels out of the wood, to give back to the state. The state then gives them to judges to use. “We’ve probably made 30 to 50 gavels over the years,” he adds.

Another fun piece he made came from a piece of black walnut that was rejected by the Winchester factory back east because the grain was wrong. The piece was given to the pattern maker, who held onto to it for 30 years. He then moved from New York to California, taking the wood with him. When he retired, he gave it to Dave’s father, who let it sit for another five years before he sent it to Dave. While it wouldn’t work for a gun, it made a beautiful bowl.

“That’s a story of a lot of wood,” says Dave. “You never know where it’s going to come from. It could have been a historical piece of wood.”

As a woodturner, Dave joined the Woodturners of Olympia. The Woodturners of Olympia’s mission is to educate members on woodturning and foster a wider understanding among the public about the traditional and contemporary art and craft of woodturning. The roughly 110 member club does monthly demonstrations, as well as demonstrations at fairs and events, including the Washington State Fair. There, they make tops for kids. They make them right there and give them away for free.
Fostering a New Generation of Woodturners

In addition, the members of WoO volunteer at Olympic High School in Bremerton. Dave loves passing along his knowledge and passion to a new generation of craftsmen.

They started out with just one class five years ago, and now they four classes at the high school. Now classes are almost 50 percent young women and they are very talented. “I love the fact that I have a number of students who really have an interest in wood working and they want to learn, they aren’t there just to fill their time,” he says. He says several of the girls are very talented and have even been in the class for multiple years.

Dave is glad to see young people taking an interest in the craft, since it almost died out in the 1970s. And of course for him, volunteering helps him keep his hands busy, which he loves.

To learn more, you can visit the Woodturners of Olympia website or attend one of their meetings that happens monthly in downtown Olympia at the First Baptist Church. To order something unique from Dave, contact him at snake4953@comcast.net or 360-456-7811

 

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Walk into Steve Sinner’s art studio and prepare to be amazed. What IS all this?

The 24-foot by 36-foot space he had built in 2001 underneath his Bettendorf home like a walk-out basement is totally filled with equipment. There are lathes, drills, a hoist and tools that he invented himself to push the limits of what he’s able to do with wood.

Hanging from the ceiling, like so many onions, are upside-down vessels of wood, already turned and hollowed once, but waiting for a second turning and hollowing after drying.

Here and there are a few pieces that are finished, or nearly so. These are vessels with such glossy, elaborate finishes that many people assume, on first glance, that they are ceramic. But no, they are wood, finished to a sheen and embellished with designs.

In woodturning, a field that has been recognized as a fine art for only the past 40 to 45 years, Sinner is a master.

His work has earned him national and international recognition in contests and in 2009 he was among 40 artists worldwide featured in “Masters Woodturning,” one of a series of compilations by New York and London publishers Lark Books.

“Steve Sinner has broken new ground with his beautifully patterned vases and goblets,” curator Jim Christiansen wrote. “Cleanly constructed and beautifully embellished, Sinner’s work blends technical expertise with high artistry.”

On Saturday, an exhibition of about 30 of Sinner’s works opened at the Figge Art Museum, Davenport, where they will be on display through June 24.

Sinner’s creations aren’t just beautiful and amazingly wrought. They also convey meaning, the meaning Sinner intended and that which the viewer brings to the piece.

“Ant Farm III,” for example, is a vessel decorated with rows of cubicles, each containing a “worker ant.” There is one empty silver cubicle, and another with gold. Every ant is oriented toward the gold cubicle.

“The piece is all about human desire and the constraints of society,” Sinner said in an email.

The improbable journey

Sinner didn’t set out to be an artist until later in life. Becoming one has been an improbable journey that happened through a series of unlikely events. In fact, “An Improbable Journey,” is the title of a talk he will give Thursday at an opening reception at the Figge.

“It’s about the chances of getting somewhere (when) the chances are slim to none,” he said.

From childhood on, Sinner had an interest in making things out of wood. It was how he played.

With a degree in industrial education from Iowa State University, he went to work for the former J.I. Case Co. in Bettendorf, making furniture and clocks at home as a hobby.

Around 1975 he read a book titled “Creative Woodturning,” by Dale Nish that “grabbed me,” Sinner said. After that he began pursuing new paths and woodturning “became a passion.”

After 21 years with Case, Sinner worked for 10 years at Family Resources Inc., Davenport, then struck out on his own to be a professional wood artist.

“I wanted to make a name for myself in the wood turning world,” he said. “I said, ‘I will go for the brass ring, and even if I don’t touch it, I will die happy.'”

Some techniques he learned in class, such as how to do gilding, the process of applying gold leaf or silver leaf to the surface of his vessels. But other techniques he taught himself.

As he explains his work, classical music from WVIK, the public radio station at Augustana College, plays in the background, and outside the large windows, all manner of birds — blue jays, cardinals, woodpeckers — swoop to the feeders in his wooded backyard.

Sinner’s favorite woods are maple, walnut and cherry, and — as with all wood workers — he is especially smitten with those that reveal an unusual grain, such as a burled piece, or one that birds have drilled into. The pathogens introduced through the holes create interesting patterns in the wood, he explains.

Although he enjoys painting and embellishing his surfaces, some are left plain, showing the natural grain of the wood.

All told, Sinner has created about 550 “serious” pieces. Large works may take three to six months or more to finish. Purchased by serious collectors, they sell in the five figures.

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A local master in woodturning, Bettendorf artist Steve Sinner, will display his work in a new exhibit opening Saturday at the Figge Art Museum, 225 W. 2nd St.

On display in the second-floor Lewis Gallery through June 24, “Steve Sinner: Master Woodturner” highlights nearly 30 examples of solo work and collaborations, as well as his innovations within the art form.

Woodturning is the process of fastening wood to a lathe that rotates around a centralized axis, allowing artists to use a series of chisels, gouges and other implements to carve away portions of the raw wood to create symmetrical forms, according to a museum release.

Traditionally, this process was used to create furniture legs, tool handles and other household implements, and Mr. Sinner is among artists who use this technique to create finely crafted vessels, the release said.

The surface of Mr. Sinner’s pieces range from “meticulously rendered geometric forms based on algorithms to figurative allegories,” the museum release said. “These designs are created from a combination of mediums, including acrylic paint, gold leaf, ink and urethane. Other surfaces are embellished by selectively removing sections of the vessel, producing a screen of perforations that allow light to permeate the form.”

Mr. Sinner, who’s worked in the field for 50 years, will give a free talk about his art at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 22, preceded by a 5:30 p.m. reception.

The artist will present “An Improbable Journey,” the story of how he set out to gain recognition in the woodturning world. He’s dedicated himself to artistic woodturning for two decades, “though his passion for and experimentation with woodturning began long before then,” the release said.

His works are found in museums, galleries and collections from coast to coast, including at the Figge Art Museum.

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We are just one day away from self-taught wood woman Barbara Dill’s multi-axis word turning demonstration at the Iridian Gallery at Diversity Richmond. It’s all happening this Saturday morning; the hour-long demonstration will start promptly at 11:00am, where we will be taken through her thought process when she invented and perfected a multi-axis wood-turning equation that has stumped woodworkers since the beginning of time. The demonstration is part of a retrospective of Dill’s work from the early 1990’s until present time, which is on exhibit for the next two months at Iridian Gallery.

Beldon has been working on this project for the Iridian Gallery for almost three years. “Barbara tried to explain the process to me but I couldn’t understand it,” Beldon said of the complex art of wood-turning. “But once I saw the process with my own eyes, physically saw how she took the wood and showed me the axis points and how to manipulate the wood properly while it is on the lathe, only then could I fully grasp and appreciate this unique and newly discovered art form.”

Beldon finds this pioneered art form especially significant because with the equation Dill has invented, you can perfectly duplicate asymmetrical turns and create perfect replicas. Previously, the multi-axis technique couldn’t be explained, only demonstrated. Now, with Dill’s process, people all over the world can be taught from the comfort of their own homes — given they have a lathe sitting in their living room. This discovery gives everyone a chance to find their own creative voice, rather than trying to copy what they see someone else doing. It opens up an entirely new world of creating new objects.

Barbara Dill has a unique story, due to the unique experiences she has had living through a changing society as part of the LGBTQ community. If you look closely at her work, her travels and political climates are reflected. The progression of her discovery over time is almost like a story.

Originally from Tennessee, Dill attended the University of Tennessee medical units in Memphis to get her nursing degree. “I moved to New England because I had started realizing that I was probably gay, and needed to get out of Tennessee so that I could get away and grow up,” she said. “After many years of not being able to adjust and accept myself as a lesbian, I was in therapy, and it was a really hard thing for me and my family to go through.”

“I had just about given up on myself,” Dill continued. “I was working in the emergency department of Boston City Hospital, where I was making plans to go back to Tennessee to take care of my family like I was scripted to do. Once I met Shelly, who is now my wife, I said, ‘Wow, I guess I am gay… and I guess it’s going to be okay after all’.”

The couple, which has now been together for thirty-three years — married for seven — moved to Richmond in 1986 to pursue their professional careers.

“We had two very different experiences once we decided to move to Richmond together. Shelly had a job as an openly gay psychiatrist at MCV. I worked as an assistant director of nursing at Chippenham Hospital, where I knew I would have been fired if anyone found out that I was gay,” Dill said. “It was a tremendous struggle moving here, because I was terrified that people were going to burn our house down.”

So how did Dill make the transition from psychiatric nursing to woodwork? “Back when I was growing up in 1988, I saw a picture of the most beautiful wooden bowl in the Smithsonian magazine,” she said. “I thought it really spoke to my soul and the only way I would be able to get it would be to make one like it. The very next day, a flier came in the mail from an adult education class just to make that bowl. And I have been in love with wood ever since.”

Dill attended a multi-axis wood-turning class in 2006 and waited for her instructor to explain the concept. But he never did. According to Dill, she asked him why he didn’t, and he replied, “I am showing you right now — all you do is change the axis here and then there.” “That’s when I thought to myself that there must be a better way to teach this,” she said. “So I began making multi-axis spindles and seeing what they had in common, until I was able to figure out a more systematic way to process wood.”

Dill explained that being a gay woman in a male-dominated profession like woodworking can be tough. “It was actually harder being a woman than being gay, once I was completely out,” she said. “Because men always want to help you and tell you what to do. I can’t even go into a hardware store and buy something without someone asking me why, and trying to help me. Because they think I don’t know what I’m doing, just because I am a woman.”

ill knows what she’s doing. She can crank out a  wooden candlestick piece in a couple of hours. “I start with the wood as my canvas, and see where it takes me,” she said. “I don’t have a picture in my head of what the final piece is going to look like when I start.”

Dill says that when it comes to woodwork, the type of wood that you decide to use as your medium makes all the difference. She prefers to use lighter wood because it creates better shadows off the angles when spun on the access the right way. She enjoys working with “green” wood, which is essentially fresh cut wood that has not had a chance to dry out and fray yet. Holly, in particular, is a favorite for her because of its fine grain, and because the stem cells don’t dry out as fast.

Dill has been teaching multi-axis wood-turning since 2006; she has also written, Multi-Axis Spindle Turning: A Systematic Exploration, that is scheduled to be published by Schiffer this summer. The book is an explanation of everything she has figured out about multi-axis turning from how to think about it and understand it to what the variables are and how to start playing with them to create building blocks to make your very own multi-access forms. This book can be preordered on Amazon by clicking here. Be sure to visit her website at http://www.barbaradill.com to see YouTube videos of how the process is done. And don’t forget to stop by her live demonstration this Saturday, February 17th starting at 11 AM at the Iridian Gallery at Diversity Richmond, located at 1407 Sherwood Ave.

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