Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 15, 1993 TAG: 9304150382
SECTION: NEIGHBORS PAGE: S-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BETSY BIESENBACH STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
GROUP AIMS TO ENCOURAGE CARVERS
Henrietta Lundgren says she goes to meetings of the Valley Woodcarvers Association only to keep her husband, John, company.She says she picks up a knife and carves alongside him just because he goes along with her hobby, collecting rocks and minerals. She also says she's not very good at carving. Then she opens a crumpled paper bag and produces an exquisite hummingbird, as detailed and delicate as the real thing. The wood has been rubbed satiny-smooth, and the little bird feels almost alive.
The association has been meeting since 1979. Its 25 members include people of all ages, both male and female, from all over the Roanoke Valley and beyond. The purpose of the group, said president Wencil Stanek, "is to encourage people to try carving."
The club was started after an article appeared in the Roanoke Times & World-News about Bob Winn, a local woodcarver. He got so many phone calls from other carvers, that he decided to form a club. Fourteen years later, he still gets calls, he said.
Some of the members, like Lundgren, come to the meetings to keep a family member company. Others have a lifetime of experience.
Stanek had to make his own toys as a child, and began carving at the age of 4. Another member, Ken Hamblin, is a well-known local dulcimer-maker. He uses his time at the club to carve fancy scrollwork on his instruments.
Jamie Breneman, 13, got a set of carving tools from his parents for Christmas, and joined the club after attending a meeting. Carving isn't easy, he admitted, but "it's fun."
One of his parents always comes with him. His mother, Lois, said that Jamie "has wanted to do this for a long time." She has taken up the hobby, too, working under the tutelage of the Lundgrens and others.
Club members make a careful distinction between an art and a craft. A craft, Stanek said, involves making the same thing over and over again. Art, on the other hand, produces one-of-a-kind objects.
Carving, he said, is an art.
Many craftspeople are attracted to carving, but soon get frustrated with it, he said. Carving takes patience and a willingness to stick to it, Winn added. Breneman, the club's newest carver, seems to have what it takes, Stanek said approvingly.
Member Tony Fanti specializes in trolls and exquisitely detailed owls. Wood, he said, is less forgiving than some other materials, such as clay. One slip of the knife and a piece is ruined. "I've started a lot of fires" with spoiled carvings, he said with a laugh.
At some meetings, there is a formal program. In January, for instance, Jim Gregory, who shows his work professionally as "Dapper Dan," demonstrated his techniques for the members.
Other months, Stanek will cut out and distribute "blanks" - blocks of wood in the general shape of the finished form. Each member completes the form according to his or her own interpretation, and no two are ever alike, Stanek said.
One of the biggest benefits of the club is the the fellowship of other carvers. Members can exchange ideas and techniques and enjoy each other's company. Hamblin, for instance, could do his carving in his workshop, but "I like to be with these people," he said. "It's an opportunity to share things."
"It's an escape, too," Fanti said. "You lose track of time." He is very painstaking with his work and calls carving, or whittling - another acceptable term, "making shavings."
"You learn a lot here," said Henrietta Lundgren. "If there's something you don't know, someone else will teach you."
None of the club members sells his or her work, Stanek said, although many of them have been asked to. When you make carvings to sell, he said, "you have to make them to someone else's specifications." Besides, he said, most of the carvers can't bear to part with their work.
Samples of the Valley Woodcarvers Association's work will be on display at the Roanoke County Public Library Headquarters during the month of April.