As my contribution to the NAAWP (National Association for the advancement of woodturning people), I've been fishing instead of turning lately, but I did muse about our craft while casting my old Creek Chub floater, retrieving my Heddon darter or jigging a mirrorlure. After a wee scotch, soup, and supper, I've been enjoying a look at "500 Bowls" and "500 Wood bowls" for the umpteenth time.
A very few of you might remember an old 30's pop song, "You push the middle valve down and the music goes round and round --yo ho, wo ho-- and it comes out here" (I doubt you need Jeffry to explain, Leo). The music that comes out sure has changed over the years and so have the turnings that come out of another instrument; the woodturning lathe. In so many ways the turnings are better now, certainly not worse, but they are different. There were signs and guides along the way. Prestini started it and Pain wrote and taught us about it. Stocksdale continued it with good design and delicate form. Lindquist engineered beauty on a shopsmith. Moulthrop added big bowls with bigger mouths. Ellsworth amazed us with hollow forms and tiny mouths. Osolnik preserved our sanity and Jordan keeps our turnings beautiful while still recognizable. There were and are, many other giants with broad shoulders for us to stand on. Of course, the narrow ones we fall off from are always with us.
The woodturner has a superb machine for making unmoldable wood round while the potter employs a plastic medium to mold all kinds of fluid shapes. I guess it's the eternal challenge and all that, but there seemed to be more rounded & contained ceramic bowls and more fenestrated and unrestrained wood bowls pictured in the two books than I expected.
Somehow this woodturner related more to the clay throwings than to the wood turnings. I hope this doesn't come over as a red-neck's loutish attempt to put-down those wonderful variations of the wood bowl. Anyway, the title is "500 Wood Bowls", not "500 _Turned_ Wood Bowls". However for me, the ceramics did seem to be comfortably traditional, more contained and somewhat rounder. I suppose that contemporary wood art often strives to stress the beholder, but this isn't always a metaphor for excellence.
As with nature, rcw abhors a vacuum, so please comment; adverse or otherwise.
Turn to Safety, Arch Fortiter