Annotation
This book gives some fine examples of Application Marquetry as well as some very unique box and table designs. Some people have some really unique and wonderful ideas. However, the other purpose I had for including this book in my references is because of the article on Michael Elkan (see below).
I was inspired by his perspective on wood, it's nature, and the "images" that he sees in the wood itself. In marquetry we so often forget about the nature of the wood, trying desperately hard to improve our technical skills, while forgetting that the wood itself can sometimes do a better job by itself. The ability to see how the color, grain, shade and texture of the wood can sometimes convey an idea better that trying to join a number of different pieces in different ways. This is something that I am personally trying to achieve in my own work, hopefully one day I can begin to feel that I am getting closer.
Michael Elkan respects the twists and turns in a tree and utilizes that character to create rough-hewn yet elegant works of art. A wood's unique characteristics and grain patterns suggest to the artist what the piece will become.
"I may look at a slice off the tree for years before the furniture within reveals itself to me," says Elkan, whose studio and home are in Oregon.
Elkan has a few woodworking skills when he began experimenting with making furniture 13 years ago in his garage. He found he had an appreciation for the design within the wood itself. Discovering opportunity in knotted burls, he sought to preserve the woods natural beauty. Among his favorites are native woods such as maple burl, walnut, horse chestnut, alder burl, redwood, white oak burl and myrtle wood.
To make a piece, Elkan begins with a single slab or hunk of wood, which has been slowly air-dried and finished off in a kiln. "Wood doesn't force easily; it won't bend into something that it does not want to be,"
The mastery evident in all his boxes, cabinets and large pieces of furniture is not due
solely to expert mechanics or unique joinery. It emerges from a desire for expression and a sensitivity to what the wood wishes to become. "I think that is what makes each piece a blend of amn and nature, which is sometimes magical," Elkan says.
"Magical" aptly describes Elkan's Gallery piece, "Monument". Like a slab hewn from a mountain of hieroglyphics, the wood box reminds one of solid, weathered stone. But closer inspection reveals shrouded doors and caverns of unexpected shape.