Cut it to See It
Instagram post on Feb 16th of so....with slight editing. This was before I figured out how to get the format right on Instagram.
A little extra learning this morning. This exercise is the hardest for beginner turners to do, especially pole lathe turners, due to the extra energy and skill involved. We have a lot invested in our work. But in the end lessons that give us more information to base a comparison on are very important.
I would argue that if you don't do this once in awhile you may be missing a lot. Chop or cut the good bowls and the bad, we need the comparison in order to improve our skills to 'see'.
I was pleased with tall tumbler. I use a pole lathe and basically have the wood I turn between two centers, I need to leave a small spindle of wood on the inside of the cup until it's complete then cut it off. So when turning I can only see and feel with my tools what I'm doing on the inside. For me cutting it in half helps me see how well I did at getting just a slightly different inner cup compared to the outer.
These end grain cups have been used for 1000's of years and I'm proud to be using the same technology as back then, a foot powered pole lathe. Using this type of lathe is not some over idealistic notion of the past, but the search for a aesthetic and ethos that can create objects that don't look so ‘machined’, as they do on an electric lathe. Because objects on my lathe moves back and forth, there are natural anomalies in the surface when the direction changes. These anomalies add something that I think our eyes enjoy looking at, even if it's happening on a unconscious level. I'm always digging deeper into my craft. There's no hurry, just careful steps forward. Every object building on the other. I'm in this for the long haul so cutting one cup is much more valuable than not. This is the story of #realcraft and the #riseofthecraftspersonclass