Blog

Rustic Birdlets

  Every band, line, swirl and mark combine to enliven and make each bird unique.  These Birdlets are plain and simple in style, each carved from a solid piece of colourful Yorkstone with distinctive natural iron ore elements running through.  Birdlets are contemporary in feel with a rustic beauty. When visiting the quarry I select […]

The Big 100 Artists Exhibition

    What a wonderful curation this is – all my stone sculpture was looking forward to being shown in the gardens at Glemham Hall alongside the other pieces, but it wasn’t to be.   With a herculean effort by the Art for Cure Team the exhibition is online instead. Happy browsing!   Opens 6pm […]

Birds in the Ancient World

    Isn’t it just a wonderful thing when you get engrossed and ‘lost’ in a book? At the moment I’m completely absorbed by Birds in the Ancient World – Winged Words – by Jeremy Mynott which explores the Greek and Roman worlds over a thousand years through their relationship with birds, from medicine to […]

In the Workshop today – chock & wedge

  It isn’t always just about carving the stone.  Time this morning has been spent in getting this block, weighing over a tonne, to a sensible height for working, and so that I can move it around the workshop as easily as possible. Just like chisels and hammers, wood battens and wedges are important tools.  […]

Easter Bird

    Happy Easter   Grey Bird freshly hatched.   Wishing you a wonderful Easter weekend.     Grey Bird        

Tools in the sunshine

  I caught a glimpse of my tools in the sunshine.  They’re all me.  I watched them, so full of joy and happiness.  They wait for hands while I figure out what to do next. In a rush I reach out and grasp tight – thankful, so very thankful, I’m not isolated from them.   […]

A Dragonfly and some Updates

  I’ve been carving a dragonfly – an Emperor Dragonfly just landed, and resting on a pebble.  Here I’m working on getting the legs as thin as I dare  and putting some detail into the tail, which will overhang the stone it is sitting on. What an apt sculpture to be working on just now […]

Hailstorms, Sunshine and Birds

  Hailstones batter the workshop roof, the wind gusting them in swirls.  Moments later the sun shines.  It is the cycle of this morning. Between each stormy bout the birds appear and resume their activity, some brave the hail battering anyway to forage and feed. And sing. And court and pair. And flit and wag. […]

Barclays Bird sculpture

  This is Barclays Bird – a sculpture carved in Portland Limestone. The stone I used for carving Barclays Bird was from a large pallet load I purchased last year.   I learned that the stone was destined for the tip, or to be crushed, and I thought it really should be re-used or re-cycled […]

Mother Nature

  Though I don’t believe nature requires personification, a popular belief in the middle ages that it be represented as mother, focusing on the life-giving, nurturing aspects, today (on Mothering Sunday) I celebrate Mother Nature. And my own mother of course!