I make my furniture from twigs and Lake Michigan driftwood, shells, stones, bark, seed pods and other natural materials. The challenge is to fabricate objects that require a certain form and symmetry, like chairs, for example, out of materials that are by nature randomly and organically shaped. I seek out the gnarliest twigs and pieces of driftwood, the curved, forked or twisted ones, because they make the most interesting furniture. No two of my chairs are ever alike in construction, although they are all identical in function. They embody the spirit of rustic design by using found or natural materials instead of manufactured ones, and at the same time evoke the many folk tales and legends of the little people of the forest. I have a lot of fun making them.

The little tables' tops are 5 inches above the surface they are standing on, and the chairs are scaled in proportion to that size.

You can email me at gcc@georgecclark.com

Friday, July 20, 2012

Another Great Weekend at Shake Rag Alley School of Arts and Crafts

Miniature Rustic Driftwood Rocking Horses Created at George C. Clark's Woodlanders Gathering Workshop 7/13/12

Pictured above is half the output of the workshop I taught last Friday morning, and the others were just as good.  My heartiest thanks go to my workshop's participants,  to Sandy and Judy and all the staff at Shake Rag Alley School of Arts and Crafts, and to all the fine instructors whose workshops my wife Pat and I participated in over the Woodlanders Gathering four day weekend.  At Woodlanders Gathering artists and craftspeople, amateurs and professionals alike, come together from all over to share skills and learn techniques in rustic crafts working with wood, fiber, forged metal, found objects, cast concrete and other mostly natural materials.  While Woodlanders Gathering concentrates on rustic crafts, Shake Rag Alley offers weekend classes and seminars year round that also include non-rustic traditional arts and even digital photography and computer graphics.  You should check out their website at Shake Rag Alley, Mineral Point, Wisconsin.

Mineral Point is a great place to visit whether you are a craftsperson or not.  It was an important lead-mining metropolis in the early 19th Century when Chicago was a village with a trading post surrounded by swamps.  When the lead played out Mineral Point became a sleepy farming community until the mid-20th Century when preservationists began to restore the historic buildings.  In the 1960s artists and craftspeople took over the downtown (High Street and Commerce Street) and now you will find a wonderful collection of artist-run studios and galleries offering fine art, rustic arts and crafts, fiber art, glass, jewelry and ceramics.  You will find my art at the Longbranch Gallery along with that of many of the other Woodlanders Gathering instructors.



Posted by at
Labels: