Look at a man’s face and his skin will give away his age: wrinkles around the eyes, scars on the hands. Look at a piece of wood, and you’ll see a similar tale unfold. Each ring within a stump’s center signifies the passage of time. Like fingerprints, woodgrain may be long, short, whorled, or gnarled. No two pieces of wood are exactly alike.
This is what true woodworkers see when they find a plank of old barn wood or a twisted branch washed ashore by the surf. Want to see what hidden potential is beneath the bark too?
Stop by the Wilding Museum’s latest exhibit, Natural Materials: Fallen Trees, Local Artisans, which runs through Feb. 13. Hosted by the Santa Ynez Valley Woodworking Guild, the exhibition and sale is chock-a-block with stunning trees-turned-art pieces. From bowls and urns made on a lathe to fine handcrafted furniture, each piece features some aspect of locally sourced wood. Exotic woods from faraway lands also make a stunning appearance.
“You’ll see reclaimed wood as well as wood from trees that have naturally fallen,” Wilding Museum Executive Director Stacey Otte-Demangate said. “These woodworkers see the opportunities in these materials and grab them.”
The Santa Ynez Valley Woodworking Guild was formed in 1994 and has expanded to include woodworkers from Atascadero, Nipomo, San Luis Obispo, and Los Osos.
The current show is a tribute to Santa Ynez Valley wood artist Bud Tullis, an integral part of the group.
“Bud was commissioned to create four of the benches at the Wildling Museum years ago and they are still used and admired by our visitors today,” Otte-Demangate said. “View a breathtaking 1853 rosewood piano that has been repurposed with extreme creativity by Ken Frye into a breathtaking cabinet intermingled with bowls made from a tree that once stood on Second Street in Solvang.”
This is the first show of its kind at the museum, although the theme is quite appropriate for its ongoing mission: to blur the lines between the outside world and our intimate, inner environment.
“The Wilding Museum represents where art meets nature, and our focus is always to inspire our visitors to care about wild places and want to preserve them for generations,” Otte-Demangate said. “I think we can all acknowledge that there is a true nature deficit disorder happening in our world.”
With so many screens, pings, and daily digital demands, people are spending less and less time outside walking the forest. The sound of Candy Crush Saga has replaced birdsong.
The photo exhibit Trees in Transition by David Paul Bayles of Oregon attempts to shake the public awake and into action. The black and white images offer a stark depiction of the Western logging industry.
“You’ll see the blur of a pine tree coming down and the rest of the forest with arresting clarity,” Otte-Demangate said of the photographer’s work. “You feel it. It’s really amazing work and a unique combination, the partnership of these two shows.”
The gallery’s permanent collection, a host of bright landscapes, round out the call of the wild. Otte-Demangate said she hopes the “powerful combo of art and nature” will motivate everyday people to reconnect to wild spaces, even if it’s just for a few moments of peace.
“People don’t have time to do serious hikes or to explore the natural world. This show is a very accessible way to get in touch with nature,” she said. “Together we can spread the message to get out into the spaces—that we need to save these spaces.”
Hayley Thomas Cain can play Candy Crush Saga in the forest all day. Contact her through Interim Managing Editor Joe Payne at jpayne@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Jan 12-19, 2017.