Carving a Reputation

Francesca Porrelli

Cornaigbeg

Francesca Porrelli trained firstly as a jeweller/ goldsmith at Medway College in Kent. She specialised in small objects de vertu, often using natural forms and combining precious metals with carved wood and stones. Her first experience of modern bird carving was the Leigh Yawkey Woodson 'Birds in Art' exhibition visiting Edinburgh from the USA in the early 1980's. Her interest was fired and opportunities to meet and learn from other carvers encouraged her to concentrate on carving. In 1987 she was awarded a Crafts Fellowship by the Scottish Development Agency to study with Jim Sprankle, a renowned waterfowl carver in the USA.

Shooting over wooden decoys has been a European practice but it is in North America over the last century or so that their manufacture and development has reached its apogee.

In the USA market gunning for wildfowl lasted legally until 1918 when legislation was introduced to conserve stocks of what had once been huge migratory flocks, numbered in millions. The demand for wooden lures also declined from this time. The fact that a battery of decoys to bring down Canvasbacks in the Chesapeake might have consisted of up to 500 decoys indicates the enormous quantities that were manufactured. Largely hand-made by the hunters who used them, factories also existed to mass produce, in several grades, on copying lathes. White pine and cedar were in common use and it was a small industry.
 
Mass mobility and increased leisure time brought numbers of sportsmen to join the burgeoning gunning clubs which employed some of the erstwhile professionals, both as guides and indirectly as skilled carvers. Sportsmen might return home with a wooden decoy as a reminder of their time on the marsh or river. Carvers who had previously turned out perhaps thousands of working decoys at a very basic price began to let their fancy take them. The 'decorative decoy' came into being. Carvers today are making intricate painted sculptures of a wide variety of birds. Some of these look so real and alive the viewer has to reach out and touch them to be convinced of their inanimate nature. There are many hundreds of professional bird carvers, and thousands more amateurs, working on North America and others from Britain to Japan have been inspired by them.

A common procedure is adopted by many carvers. The species is decided and wood selected. Basswood, a lime, Tupelo Gum, from the southern swamps and Jelutong, a kind of rubber tree are all popular, being light, strong in thin section, and close grained. Photographs, sketches, notes, mounts or study skins are scrutinised and assembled, and perhaps a live bird in the case of waterfowl. Some carvers keep a small aviary for this purpose. A clay model, accurate but not detailed, may be swiftly made and anatomical relationships worked out if the pose is a complicated one; preening or wingstretching for example, must look graceful and attractive as well as being correctly positioned. From this model, measurements can be directly transferred to the wood or to a paper pattern for subsequent use. Excess wood is removed from the block with a bandsaw, or hand saw in awkward places. To contour down to form a wide choice of machine and hand tools may be used - a well honed carving knife is quiet and dust free, if a little slow, but chisels, surforms and rotary tools are also employed. I like to carve completely the head and bill and set in the eyes (quality glass taxidermy eyes), this establishes some rapport, and the character of the bird, and the long journey to the tail can proceed.

To make feather groups look natural, their shape, flow and contour are created by carving mounds and depressions. Quills and flow lines are constantly re-established on the surface with pencil. Deep undercuts in the tertial and primary areas are excavated with knives and scalpels and long sharked cutters. Fragile and thin sections or separation of tail feathers are worked over with a small grinding stone which can give a mobile lively look. To create the fine lines of barbs and quills each feather is engraved with a temperature controlled pyrographic pen.

All the effort of carving seems to be a preparation for painting. An indifferent carving can improve greatly if well painted and a good one become marvellous. Oil or acrylic paint have been used and now a stable gouache type paint is avaliable. Despite slower drying time I find oil paint unparalleled for richness of tone, permanence and glazing qualities, but everyone has preferences. Iridescence is applied using finely ground synthetic nacreous powders which are mixed into the paint and effects are highlighted by underpainting. Wood duck drakes are a popular (though risky) subject.

In many ways painting is the most exciting and challenging part. As carving techniques appear to have almost reached the limits of what is technically possible perhaps it's the painting of plumage that will become ever more refined.

The working and reworking of the surface is time consuming and concentrated and a complex carving may have had hundreds of hours devoted to it.

Has it all been worthwhile? The viewers will be the final arbiters but the growing demand for this kind of wildlife art indicates a rosy future for the best of these carvings.