rod
~ Elite 1000 Member ~
I have been below the radar, while wandering in Europe for a while with my wife, Kathleen, in France, Italy, and then going up to my Scottish workshop. Internet access has not been so good where we have been. I got to look in on the Forums a bit, but now that I am back in my main base in Mendocino, California, I can see that I have missed out on a lot of good stuff, and it will take some time to get through it. I have been taking the opportunity to look at the profusion of ornamentaion that is everywhere in the old countries, and with your permission, I will post, without text, a few photos as the days go by, in a series that could be called "scrolling through Europe", just for fun, as it may tweak your muse in an idle moment, and that is never a bad thing for us all.
Item 1: A bitter sweet moment was in selling our wee Highland cottage, where I have maintained my Scottish workshop for decades, managing to get a few months of work done in Europe each year, raising my family in the two cultures, seeing baroque flute players on that side of the Atlantic, and thickening up my brogue, lest I become understandable. I started that when our younger daughter was four. She is now 27, and working in Hollywood, so that part of life is over. Her summers living in Scotland where a rich source of character material for her acting career, and she still does a humiliatingly good take-off of her dad's brogue at its thickest!
Item 2: Barry Lee! A big congratulations to you in lending your weight to the Steve Lindsay Forum in your new official position. Your work, and all of your tutorial postings are an inspiration for us all! As a toolmaker, I confess to being drawn to the good inventions of others, and cannot resist the fun of trying all of the goodies I can getting my hands. So I pack two pistols these days ... GRS full set-up, and a Lindsay foot control Air Graver, both of which hold me fascinated. I confess in all humility that many a contributer to the Lindsay and iGraver forums could pick up a rusty nail off the ground and do fine art with it that would leave my best efforts in the shade. Thank you, Barry, Sam, Brian, Coincutter, and all who are offering such great tutorials on both forums!
Barry Lee, I was very pleased to read your posting letting us know that the Lindsay Forum was shifting to a "come one, come all" format. Certainly, there is value in a forum which concentrates on specific sharing related to the Air Graver, and that Forum has always had plenty of excellent spin off for the general reader, but this small shift in context may indeed yield yet more value for us all, hopefully without any loss of attention to Air Graver specific postings. Thank you, Steve L, for adding this latest chapter to the already very valuable contribution of your Forum. Although I am not a gun engraver, I also get great value from FEGA, particularly its videos!
Item 3: We know that "Coincutter" Steve has been active in the Forums, and quite often in the thick of the "debate du jour". In private emails, I have found him to be very generous with hints, tips, and encouragement, and he has put up many a column inch in postings on the Lindsay and iGraver Forums with helpful photos and procedures. While visiting my sister in Colorado last month, I was close to his home base, and got to go along to his workshop for a few days of chit-chat and cutting. Dave London joined in, and we had a heck of at time. Steve E had a long career as a painter of large canvases, before moving over to coin cutting. It did not take him long to read me like a book, and see clearly where I needed a kick in the pants to move me along with my work. After covering the usual interesting stuff about cutting, etc., and having some good stories to swop back and forth, he wrote me a brief paragraph that got to the heart of the matter, in my case, ... and I wonder if it might help others, who are in the process of mastering their craft. Basically, I have no problem being a front runner in my main gig as a historical flutemaker, but I have boxed myself in when it comes to the arts. Steve E nailed in very nicely in this communication....
".........So now it's time for the teacher (if I can call myself that) to tell you something you may not wish to hear, Rod.
You are ready to do this. You have seen what the best have to offer and teach. You know how it's done. It's time to stop being a student, and do what ever it is that comes from the experience and training both formal and informal that you have had. You have but two choices in this field. You can be an engraver, or a student. As they say, lead, follow, or get out of the way. It's always better to be a lead dog. It's just a turning point in your mind, when you make the shift to stop thinking like a student, and go with what you have. I heard you time and time again express that you were an artisan and not an artist. That's a conscious choice. One you make because you have the misconception in place that you are not an artist.
Well, art is an individual thing. There are no masters in the engraving world, only different comfort levels with the tools. Most people can only do one thing well, I have a feeling that you will go way beyond that if you just make the leap. There are no rules, only mutual agreements. Art is all about learning the rules, so you can break, them not follow them.
I don't know how else to express it, but perhaps you will find it in these few paragraphs.
Kick a**, my friend! Now or never...... Steve E."
Pretty good, I thought?
Item 4: .. And, for me, it segways into just another way of saying what, for example, Ron Smith offers in his books, teachings, and in his postings. He is giving us the 'tools', the basics, and the principles, but it is up to us to get into orbit.
I have been enjoying catching up on the many fine postings that took on a life of their own, stemming from my earlier wee story on the loose subject of "Copying". John B, I was delighted to see that thread broaden out to include many valuable viewpoints.
Yet another word, talking about "copying". Last month, while on my way from Scotland to a family wedding in Paris, I got to spend a few hours in the London National Gallery, by Trafalgar Square. I had some specific paintings to see, but wandering around that gallery is indeed heady stuff. I was moved in other ways. Groups of young children formed a circle around some of the masterworks, listening quietly, and sometimes interacting, with art experts who would go deeply into the symbolism and originality of the painting, while often an advanced art student sat nearby with pencil and eraser, working for hours, sketching the painting, often re-drawing a detail twenty times, drawing, erasing, drawing, erasing, until they appeared to grasp what the master was intending, and in this way broadening their understanding, bit by bit. I was fascinated to watch the process unfold. These 'students' were highly accomplished, so that the lesson unfolding before me happened quite rapidly.
There is no substitute for a deep study of how a masterwork goes together, and this should equip us the better to launch into orbit for ourselves.
Finally: Hey, Ron! I have signed on to attend your combined class with Diane Scalese, in Kansas this November, and I am looking forward to it. I hoping that we will again find a little after-hours time to work over some of them Texas rock n' roll songs? I will pack a guitar and mandolin. I may be a Scots singer, yet I do love them oldies but goodies from down your way, playing the twelve bar blues and howlin' at the moon!
best
Rod
Item 1: A bitter sweet moment was in selling our wee Highland cottage, where I have maintained my Scottish workshop for decades, managing to get a few months of work done in Europe each year, raising my family in the two cultures, seeing baroque flute players on that side of the Atlantic, and thickening up my brogue, lest I become understandable. I started that when our younger daughter was four. She is now 27, and working in Hollywood, so that part of life is over. Her summers living in Scotland where a rich source of character material for her acting career, and she still does a humiliatingly good take-off of her dad's brogue at its thickest!
Item 2: Barry Lee! A big congratulations to you in lending your weight to the Steve Lindsay Forum in your new official position. Your work, and all of your tutorial postings are an inspiration for us all! As a toolmaker, I confess to being drawn to the good inventions of others, and cannot resist the fun of trying all of the goodies I can getting my hands. So I pack two pistols these days ... GRS full set-up, and a Lindsay foot control Air Graver, both of which hold me fascinated. I confess in all humility that many a contributer to the Lindsay and iGraver forums could pick up a rusty nail off the ground and do fine art with it that would leave my best efforts in the shade. Thank you, Barry, Sam, Brian, Coincutter, and all who are offering such great tutorials on both forums!
Barry Lee, I was very pleased to read your posting letting us know that the Lindsay Forum was shifting to a "come one, come all" format. Certainly, there is value in a forum which concentrates on specific sharing related to the Air Graver, and that Forum has always had plenty of excellent spin off for the general reader, but this small shift in context may indeed yield yet more value for us all, hopefully without any loss of attention to Air Graver specific postings. Thank you, Steve L, for adding this latest chapter to the already very valuable contribution of your Forum. Although I am not a gun engraver, I also get great value from FEGA, particularly its videos!
Item 3: We know that "Coincutter" Steve has been active in the Forums, and quite often in the thick of the "debate du jour". In private emails, I have found him to be very generous with hints, tips, and encouragement, and he has put up many a column inch in postings on the Lindsay and iGraver Forums with helpful photos and procedures. While visiting my sister in Colorado last month, I was close to his home base, and got to go along to his workshop for a few days of chit-chat and cutting. Dave London joined in, and we had a heck of at time. Steve E had a long career as a painter of large canvases, before moving over to coin cutting. It did not take him long to read me like a book, and see clearly where I needed a kick in the pants to move me along with my work. After covering the usual interesting stuff about cutting, etc., and having some good stories to swop back and forth, he wrote me a brief paragraph that got to the heart of the matter, in my case, ... and I wonder if it might help others, who are in the process of mastering their craft. Basically, I have no problem being a front runner in my main gig as a historical flutemaker, but I have boxed myself in when it comes to the arts. Steve E nailed in very nicely in this communication....
".........So now it's time for the teacher (if I can call myself that) to tell you something you may not wish to hear, Rod.
You are ready to do this. You have seen what the best have to offer and teach. You know how it's done. It's time to stop being a student, and do what ever it is that comes from the experience and training both formal and informal that you have had. You have but two choices in this field. You can be an engraver, or a student. As they say, lead, follow, or get out of the way. It's always better to be a lead dog. It's just a turning point in your mind, when you make the shift to stop thinking like a student, and go with what you have. I heard you time and time again express that you were an artisan and not an artist. That's a conscious choice. One you make because you have the misconception in place that you are not an artist.
Well, art is an individual thing. There are no masters in the engraving world, only different comfort levels with the tools. Most people can only do one thing well, I have a feeling that you will go way beyond that if you just make the leap. There are no rules, only mutual agreements. Art is all about learning the rules, so you can break, them not follow them.
I don't know how else to express it, but perhaps you will find it in these few paragraphs.
Kick a**, my friend! Now or never...... Steve E."
Pretty good, I thought?
Item 4: .. And, for me, it segways into just another way of saying what, for example, Ron Smith offers in his books, teachings, and in his postings. He is giving us the 'tools', the basics, and the principles, but it is up to us to get into orbit.
I have been enjoying catching up on the many fine postings that took on a life of their own, stemming from my earlier wee story on the loose subject of "Copying". John B, I was delighted to see that thread broaden out to include many valuable viewpoints.
Yet another word, talking about "copying". Last month, while on my way from Scotland to a family wedding in Paris, I got to spend a few hours in the London National Gallery, by Trafalgar Square. I had some specific paintings to see, but wandering around that gallery is indeed heady stuff. I was moved in other ways. Groups of young children formed a circle around some of the masterworks, listening quietly, and sometimes interacting, with art experts who would go deeply into the symbolism and originality of the painting, while often an advanced art student sat nearby with pencil and eraser, working for hours, sketching the painting, often re-drawing a detail twenty times, drawing, erasing, drawing, erasing, until they appeared to grasp what the master was intending, and in this way broadening their understanding, bit by bit. I was fascinated to watch the process unfold. These 'students' were highly accomplished, so that the lesson unfolding before me happened quite rapidly.
There is no substitute for a deep study of how a masterwork goes together, and this should equip us the better to launch into orbit for ourselves.
Finally: Hey, Ron! I have signed on to attend your combined class with Diane Scalese, in Kansas this November, and I am looking forward to it. I hoping that we will again find a little after-hours time to work over some of them Texas rock n' roll songs? I will pack a guitar and mandolin. I may be a Scots singer, yet I do love them oldies but goodies from down your way, playing the twelve bar blues and howlin' at the moon!
best
Rod
