American Indian
Yes, I agree he’s a bit gruesome!!!!!! He is carved out of a Spalted Hawthorn root which I found when checking through the hedgerows on one of my morning walks. I can’t stop being a scrounger much to my wife’s annoyance.
Ever since my childhood of watching John Wayne movies with my Grandma, I have had a fascination for the culture and ideology of the North American Indian and their close workings with mother nature and only taking what they needed. Maybe sentimental hogwash taken off the movie screens, but a lesson we need to learn in current times.
I loved the way the root had shaped itself and I had enough wood on the top to carve the face but not much else. His hair is a wig made out of ash and the feathers are carved from lime, all sitting on a beech plinth. The hair is coloured with ebony stain and the earrings are curtain rings with a beech bead attached. The root could have been an old hag or a witch character, but it works as it is. I have some more of the wood so we’ll see what is inspired by that.
One problem was that some of the wood was much softer than rest, so it tore rather than was carved/cut (rather like cork). The solution was a lot of shaping using Dremel sanding drums and then carefully cutting. The eyes are painted as I lost them in the carving process. I may replace them at a later date with plastic, mother of pearl or wood beads. He is finished in a clear acrylic spray as to not distort the wood colours.
