The carver's art.(Design notes)(Master carver Allan S. Webb keeps the craft alive at Julius Lowy Frame and Restoring Company)(Biography)

Stabbing down, wasting away, and undercutting are just a few of the techniques, and veiners, macaronis, fluteronis, skew chisels, and fishtail gouges are some of the tools that enable a wood carver to coax exquisite figures, flora, fauna, and ornamental motifs out of a simple block of wood. Like stone, wood is an unforgiving material that demands a carver with a sure sense of design, an unerring eye for infinitesimal detail, and the patience of Job. A sculptor needs only about a handful of different chisels to successfully chip away at a block of stone, whereas a wood carver needs about one hundred gouges. This is because a carver must slice through the wood (sometimes against the grain), leaving a mark that is identical to the shape of the tool used. When at work, wood carvers are almost always ambidextrous, and they usually work from the same side of the bench.

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Creating carved embellishments for decorative arts objects, particularly furniture and frames, was a highly regarded skill in earlier times, and it still is today, because it is beyond the reach of any machine. Because carvers work from drawings they must be able to visualize a two-dimensional pattern in three dimensions. In many instances they must adapt their carving for gilding. This means adding depth to each cut so that after the application of gesso, bole, and gold leaf the carved elements still have crisp definition. As any gilder will tell you, their success depends entirely on the carver's work.

Mastering carving skills is a lengthy process achieved through practice and more practice. And, like all crafts that depend solely on the human hand, even a master carver needs lots of time to do the job. Thus carvings are expensive, which is one reason the craft no longer flourishes as it certainly did in earlier times. Happily one firm, Julius Lowy Frame and Restoring Company in New York City, and one master ...