Artists and woodworkers

[Jacob]

All the above have made stuff in either stone or metal or paint as well.

Tony Cragg? https://www.google.com/search?q=tony+cr ... 11&biw=960
Dozens of the boogers!
I don't think the materials made much difference to their ratings, but why not have a go with other materials anyway?

My point is if you ONLY do wood then you aint an artist. Yet again Jacob read and absorb before you open yer gob

edit typo

Before you open yours why don't you just google "Sculpture Wood" or similar, then read and absorb?

 

[AJB Temple]

Re wood as art....I don't know about the last 100 years, but if we go back to early English oak furniture (including ecclesiastical) from say 1500 to 1650, some of the most highly prized and valuable work is carved. This quality may well have helped ensure survival.

It is a pity that so little wooden sculptural work is signed.

Part of the issue may be that furniture, screens and so on may be primarily functional and secondarily decorative?

 

[Jacob]

Brancusi was almost entirely influenced by Romanian vernacular woodwork - ordinary anonymous "country" style, architectural and some of it industrial - mill components and similar https://www.google.com/search?q=romania ... 60&bih=511

 

[MikeG.]

......It is a pity that so little wooden sculptural work is signed.

Part of the issue may be that furniture, screens and so on may be primarily functional and secondarily decorative?

I'm not following along closely so forgive me if I've hold of the wrong end of the stick. Screens and furniture were generally the product of a reasonably large number of people, and in the case of church screens some of the larger and more complex stuff may have taken more than one generation. Finding one person eligible to sign it may have been awkward. However, whilst I can understand the lack of a "signature" (don't forget, most woodworkers in those dim and distant days would have been illiterate anyway), it's less easy to see why more of the important pieces weren't dated.

 

[Student]

With regard to AJB’s comment, “Most of the church tryptichs and such like would have been framed, and some research of Flemish ones that I have seen in Amsterdam suggests that they were painted whilst in frame.”, there are some depictions of Saint Luke, the patron saint of the Painters’ Guild, painting the Madonna which clearly show him painting inside the ready made frame

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Luk ... aegert.jpg

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Luk ... ch_008.jpg

 

[MikeG.]

......if we go back to early English oak furniture (including ecclesiastical) from say 1500 to 1650, some of the most highly prized and valuable work is carved........

I've been thinking about this for a while, particularly in the last 3 days as I've fed hundreds of feet of boards into a thicknesser....so much mediaeval stuff was carved that it seems to me that we might have over-estimated how important it was to flatten boards. Apart from crude country furniture bashed together by the semi-skilled, I'll bet there aren't too many pieces from say the 14th century through to the 18th century most parts other than the top weren't carved.

 

[Student]

Going back to AJB’s earlier post where he says that “for example there is evidence of a hall house dining table of 75ft long and (from memory about 40" wide) being made from a single plank. The table still exists but has been cut down to around 42ft over the years”, perhaps he is referring to the one mentioned here

//www.nationaltrust.org.uk/tredegar-house/features/the-orangery-garden

where the top was 62 feet long before it was cut short. (the base is not original and, from what I remember from my visit to Tredegar House some years’ ago, the table was very badly stored by the local council for many years before being given to the NT for display at Tredegar House).

 

[Droogs]

All the above have made stuff in either stone or metal or paint as well.

Tony Cragg? https://www.google.com/search?q=tony+cr ... 11&biw=960
Dozens of the boogers!
I don't think the materials made much difference to their ratings, but why not have a go with other materials anyway?

My point is if you ONLY do wood then you aint an artist. Yet again Jacob read and absorb before you open yer gob

edit typo

Before you open yours why don't you just google "Sculpture Wood" or similar, then read and absorb?

I don't have to Google anything about this subject Jacob as unlike you I am talking from personal experience in dealing with the various art funding bodies in the UK and the EU and their official policy is that woodwork is not art even when that woodwork is a proposed 18foot wide 8 foot high boulle marquetry picture ala Roentegen style as in the Vienna museum (and possibly contain pietra dura). Even that is not art apparently. The idea for the project was to provide a way for disabled vetrans to learn new skills and overcome disability to form a pathway for a new career by creating a commemorative art piece for WW1 and its centenary to then be displayed at the Imperial war museum. I spent 2 years arguing the toss for this and was told emphatically it was in no way art.

 

[Jacob]

....... The idea for the project was to provide a way for disabled vetrans to learn new skills and overcome disability to form a pathway for a new career by creating a commemorative art piece for WW1 and its centenary to then be displayed at the Imperial war museum. I spent 2 years arguing the toss for this and was told emphatically it was in no way art.

So the argument was not about the craft and material but about whether or not what you produced would be "art". Actually it's a very old argument and goes on continuously.
It sounds like an interesting project but perhaps you simply applied for help from the wrong people. Or perhaps training for new skills on the one hand, and the commemorative product on the other, didn't easily conflate? I don't know.
It does sound very much a "craft" or "decorative arts"project .
The majority of craft workers simply accept that what they do is not "art", but some live in hopes of being discovered as having the mysterious extra thing of interest to the world of art.
PS had to look up Roentgen and pietra dura. Very interesting. It seems that Roentgen wasn't rated for artistic or design ability in terms of the overall product, but was highly rated as a master craftsman in terms of marquetry and inlay. There you have it?

 

[Student]

Last weekend there was a programme, on BBC2 or BBC4 I forget which, about lost masterpieces in British museums. The presenters went to the museum in Swansea where they discovered an old painting that turned out to be by a contemporary of Rubens. The painting was on a wooden panel and, what was interesting from my point of view, was that they were able to date it because the panel had a maker's mark, like a hall mark, on the back. It appears that, in the Courtauld Gallery, there is a book that some professor spent decades researching that lists many of the old "hallmarks" on wooden panels and the presenter was able to find that the panel had been made in Antwerp between 1619 and 1622.

 

[whiskywill]

The painting was on a wooden panel and....... they were able to date it because the panel had a maker's mark, like a hall mark, on the back.

But, surely, that doesn't necessarily date the painting. It could have been added at any time since the panel was made.

 

[AJB Temple]

I think there is some evidence, from what I have read in Dutch historical books, that the Guild system in the Netherlands (including Belgium) was developed somewhat differently than here in the UK, with trades more divided or discernible, and with brands or stamps for their trade. It would seem likely that stamping occurred at the point the article was made.

Leaving aside the obvious example of silver, stamping was less common in England. I have never seen an English panel stamp, but I have seen them in Amsterdam, Delft etc.

It may well repay some research.

 

[Student]

The painting could well have been done at any time after it was painted but the dating of the panel was just one part of the jigsaw of clues. The panel was made at the same time as the artist in question was working in Antwerp. If the panel had been made after he died, for example, that would have meant that the painting couldn't have been by him.