When I was growing up, my dad had a basement workshop that he used to make boxes, shelves, pieces of furniture and other odds and ends, mostly just for fun. I used to follow him around, holding tools and asking pestering questions, but didn't show much interest in doing my own projects until I was much older. I was much more interested in other mediums I considered more exotic, such as oil painting and glass work. When I went to college, I switched back and forth among majors and took every art class I could fit in my schedule. I was never able to settle on one thing that really raised my sails. I would start a class with excitement, hellbent on proving to myself that this was the thing for me. But eventually I'd get bored, and start to meander, which led to work that was uninspired and not particularly well conceived. Eventually, Littleton Alston, one of my professors, kind of took me under his wing, and for a while, I was a sculpture major. That didn't last long, either; it just wasn't something I saw a future for myself in. But I continued working with Littleton and he became a major inspiration and resource for me - that's a story that demands a post of its own.
I still knew I wanted to make things that looked interesting but had some sort of physical usefulness. So, I started making boxes and trying my hand at a few coffee tables. But just as with the other traditional mediums I was working in, I felt confined. I felt like I was making things that were ultimately just tables, or just boxes. My designs were a reflection of my own aesthetic, but this wasn't enough.
Then came my first chair, and an entire world of possibility seemed to open up for me. I don't think I approached making a chair any differently than I had other items. But the foreigness of its elements, and its symbiotic relationship with the human form, challenged and ignited me in ways that nothing else had. I started considering the negative and positive space occupied and created by a chair, such as the back and seat. I became just as interested in the space underneath the seat and its overall silhouette too. In fact, with my earliest chair designs, I gave consideration to these elements of form more than I did things like weight distribution, scale and structural stability. It quickly occurred to me that with chairs I could convey ideas, ask question and invite interaction. In effect, a chair no longer had - and in my case, I decided no longer could - be just a thing you sit on. Thankfully, I've found a network of people who find this interesting and are willing to entertain my ideas.
I suppose I'm not concerned a whole lot with the semantics of titles. However, for all of us who choose to do what is often labeled "woodworking", there is a financial issue at stake as well. If something has function, is it less compelling, intellectually, physically and aesthetically than, say, an abstract painting? Should it be treated less uniquely by the marketplace?
I re-visited Omaha's Joslyn Art Museum several months ago when my family came for a visit. While looking at a Mark Rothko painting, I was struck by the fact that none of the beautiful cherry benches placed throughout the museum had any tag identifying their maker, date or material. What is it that keeps one of these benches from being the thing protected by velvet ropes with a label next to it on the wall? I suppose, practically, there wouldn't be anything to sit on then, huh?
For those of us, again, who are often labeled, or call ourselves "woodworkers", I think a more important question than the semantics - or semiotics - of a title is, Why am I making this object? or maybe, Is this object more than it appears to be? or maybe even, Why is this object what it is?
If we continue to ask ourselves these questions, and ask other makers and consumers to consider them in relation to our work and their own, we will continue striving to put as much of ourselves in our work as we can. Perhaps that's all that matters.
I never cared much for titles anyway : )
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