color contrast pt 2

Well the king is finished and his name is Ryan, which happens to be my son’s name who told me not to give up on this carving. We found out as well that the name Ryan in Gaelic translates to “little king”, what better name for the king of the leprechauns. This carving started out as a corner piece, you know, a carving from a practice stick that is only done one half of the block. Well after I had carved out the front side and Ryan (my son) showed an interest in having him in his room I thought I should carve out his back side as well. The funny thing was I had already begun to paint him, you see for some reason my son not only wanted me to save this carving but he also wanted him to have a red beard. So I started to carve him, broke his nose (trying to muscle the wood, bad idea), finished the initial carving, but I’m not done yet. Second half, started to paint him, decided to carve the back side, carved off some of the old paint with minor changes to original design and repainted him. 

From all this was born Ryan, king of the leprechauns. I have added more pictures than I normally would but wanted to give you a good look at the transition he went through. All in all it was worth it and it taught me a lesson in carving. No matter what mistake was made and no matter what you thought it would end up to be complete each carving and see how it looks complete.

Michelangelo once said “Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it”.