When a flat-sawn board has reversing grain it will usually exhibit a swirling grain pattern on its faces or edges, warning you that it could be difficult to plane.
I have always heard this swirl as being called a “cat’s face,” though I cannot remember where I first heard it. In 1993 in a hand tool class? Who knows.
Whenever I teach handplaning I warn students to look for a cat’s face nested amongst the cathedrals of the plainsawn boards. Mostly they think my explanation is nuts. So I point it out to them.
“Look. That’s a cat. See it?”
I swear that they don’t even humor me. And you wonder why I stopped teaching.
Today I was sanding down the first coat of paint on 1.2 miles of moulding for our new storefront and the sun reflected this perfect cat’s face. Our Cincinnati Zoo is famous for its white tigers, and that’s exactly what I saw.
Today I applied the finish to my latest Welsh stick chair and opted for a blend of linseed oil and beeswax made by Swede Paint Enterprises. During the last year it has become one of my favorite finishes for traditional pieces.
I had considered using a soap finish for the chair but opted for the linseed oil and wax blend because it will darken with exposure to light and oxygen. A soap finish would have preserved the light color – almost ghostliness – of the sycamore.
Note: Before you read another word, know that Swede Paint distributes our books in Canada. We got involved with them because of their fantastic finishing products and business philosophy. We do not benefit in any way from sales of their finishing products. But we do love their products.
The linseed oil and beeswax mix is a joy to use. It has the consistency of something between mayonnaise and peanut butter, but is surprisingly not sticky. It absorbs readily into bare wood and forms a matte and smooth surface that is superior to linseed oil alone.
Like all finishes that involve linseed oil and wax, it is not a permanent or highly protective finish. You will need to apply more finish in a few years. But it is easily maintained and repaired. I prefer this quality (repair-ability) over film finishes such as varnish or urethane that can be difficult to repair.
Two thin coats of finish produced a beautiful and touchable luster. It is an excellent finish for beginners who are inexperienced with finishing. Even though I’ve used everything from high-performance film finishes, shellac, pine tar, asphaltum, pre-cat lacquer, to you name it, this finish suits me. It’s simple, natural and easily renewed. Check it out.
Note: Disco Ty will not be attending the open day. Your spouse is safe.
As per our regular schedule, the Lost Art Press storefront will be open on Saturday, Nov. 12, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. We will have our complete line of books, plus T-shirts (lots of them), free posters, free stickers and blemished books for 50 percent off.
Our storefront is at 837 Willard St. in Covington, Ky. If you are coming in from out of town, I recommend you check out the newly opened Hotel Covington. It’s a 5-minute walk from our storefront and has a fantastic hotel restaurant, Coppin’s. (Try the corn fritters.)
Also, recently I got to eat at Inspirado, a restaurant across the street from Hotel Covington. I love the food – a global melange that totally works. Also new to our neighborhood (all located on Main Strasse around the corner from us):
Hail Dark Aesthetics: This is a vinyl record and skull store. OK, it’s more than that, but it’s filled with records and skulls. And bisected cats. My daughters love this place and it features the best one-eyed goat T-shirt I’ve ever seen.
Commonwealth Bistro: A restaurant that has been a couple years in the works. I’m dying to get in there and try the fried rabbit. Word on the street is the restaurant is very good.
Crafts and Vines: A new wine bar, tap room and charcuterie place. Very friendly place.
What will I be doing at the storefront next Saturday? Good question. I’m finishing up two chairs for a client and then I have a long list of things to build: a Danish modern drop-leaf table, a Campaign-style bookcase, a ladder (yes, a ladder, it’s my new obsession), and a dustpan to replace the crappy metal one from the home center.
‘Hogar Nazareth’ (1627-1681) by Diego Quisepe Tito (q1611-1681). In the Thoma Collection.
In Part II includes more benches and angels, a new painting style, a mystery and a few other things. Get your snacks and drinks ready.
Peru
Peru starts in Cuzco, capital city of the Incas, and with the Quecha painter Diego Quisepe Tito. Tito is considered the most important painter of the Cuzco School, and his work includes at least four scenes of Saint Joseph engaged in woodworking. Although the painting above is dark with age we can see a simple bench without a vise. The background is too dark to see a tool rack, but there are a few tools on the ground.
‘Escenas de la Infancia de Jesus-Hogar de Nazareth’ by Diego Quisepe Tito. Iglesia Parroquial San Senastian, Cuzco. Photo: ARCA.
When Joseph is in the background we usually can’t see much detail about his bench. In this painting it is easy to see there is a face vise with hurricane-shaped nuts on a staked bench. And Joseph is wearing a hat not usually seen on a member of the Holy Family.
‘Hogar en Nazareth’ by Diego Quisepe Tito. Iglesia de San Sebastian, Cuzco. Photo: ARCA.
A staked bench with a planing stop. Look a little closer and on the left side of the bench there is a board held upright by a face vise. A saw hangs on the wall, and I am happy to see a basket of tools.
Last night I tried to find a color photo of this painting and what I found instead was the sad news that the painting was one of 24 lost in a fire at Iglesia de San Sebastian last year.
Left: ‘Sagrada Familia en Nazareth’ (1675?) Diego Quisepe Tito or his circle. Museo Universidad de Turabo. Right: ‘El Taller de Nazareth’ Anon. 18th c. Monasterio Madras Carmelitas, Ayacucho. Photos: ARCA.
Both of these paintings are a copy of a Flemish engraving by the Wierix brothers. On the left, the artist was faithful to the original engraving keeping the toolbox (behind Joseph) and tools on the ground. The artist on the right changed the saw, perhaps copying a saw seen in use at the construction of a new building. He also left out the tool box and most of the tools on the ground. You might have noticed a whole new look to previous paintings. Brighter colors, intricate patterns (with matching birds on the left), gold leaf, native flowers and landscapes.
At the time the above paintings were done the Spanish had been colonizing the Americas for well over a century. A style of painting evolved in Cuzco when, in the late 17th century, Spanish-born and mestizo artists split away from the Amerindian artists of the painting guild. This freed the indigenous painters to incorporate colors and patterns from their cultures into copies of European art. It is thought Diego Quisepe Tito helped lead this effort that is now known as the Cusquena-style of painting.
‘El Taller Nazaret’ (1722), Anon. Monasterio de Santa Catalina, Arequipa. Photo: ARCA.
A nice sturdy bench with stout legs. Only the axe is left on the ground. The chisels are nicely arranged in a basket with the divider used as a…divider! I think the artist may have given the bench such a great length in order to fill the lunette.
‘Taller de San Jose’ 18th c. Anon. Museo National de la Cultura Peruana.
A staked bench with somewhat wonky legs, a parrot and Jesus at sawyer duty. Another trait of the Cusquena style you may have noticed is a lack of perspective.
If some, or many, of the colonial paintings seem familiar it is because of the use of a large set of engravings the Jesuits brought to the Americas to use in converting the indigenous peoples to Christianity. In the mid-16th century the founder of the Jesuits commissioned a series of engravings on the life of Christ from the Wierix brothers, well-known and prolific Flemish engravers. The commission was given in the mid-16th century by the founder of the Jesuits. The engravings were used in Jesuit conversions in their missions in the Americas and Asia.
The next three paintings are copies of Wierix engravings and show other woodworking scenes.
‘Techando la Casa de Nazareth’ (1670), Diego Quisepe Tito. Iglesia de San Sebastian, Cuzco. Photo: PESSCA.
Joseph’s low staked bench sits at the bottom of a substantial gangway-type ladder.
‘Joven Carpintero’ 17th c. Anon. Museo Pedro de Osma, Lima. Photo: ARCA.
Joseph, Jesus and the angels are building a lattice for the garden. The usual assortment of tools are tossed about.
‘La Baracaza’ 18th c. Anon. Museo del Palacio Arzobispal, Lima. Photo: ARCA.
Joseph is driving trennels into the boat.
The gallery has one more Wierix-related painting, two vistas and a map.
Bolivia
During the colonial era Bolivia was known as Alto Peru.
Vista of Potosi, 1758 by Gaspar Miguel del Barrio. Museo Charcas.
The silver mines of Potosi helped drive the trade with Asia and filled the coffers of Spain. During the height of its mining production Potosi was the wealthiest city in the Americas.
‘La Sagrada Familia en el Taller de Nazareth’ (1689-1732) by Melchor Perez de Holguin (1660-1732).
Melchor Perez de Holguin was a mestizo and the dominant painter in Potosi into the 1720s. Although the Cusquana style of painting was found in Alto Peru, de Holguin’s work falls into the Potosi school and was heavily influenced by the Spanish artist Zurbaran.
Joseph’s bench is much like those seen in other paintings from Peru and representative of all the benches I’ve found for Bolivia.
Although his workshop is in the background the painter did not stint on detail. The bench is staked with tapered legs. The plane is put aside while Joseph uses a chisel. His adze sits on the near end of the workbench. On the wall is a tool rack and on the floor another full set of tools.
I almost left out the next painting but something must have held me back.
‘La Casa en Nazaret’ late 18th c. Anon. Collection of Roberta & Richard Huber.
It was the curvy legs (with stretchers!) and ornate plane. They were just too good to pass up.
‘El Taller de Nazareth’ 17th c. Anon. Private collection. Photo: ARCA.
This work is from La Paz. The bench is staked, has a planing stop and a face vise. There is a nice collection of tools even if they are all over the floor. OK, OK, if they were piled into a basket we wouldn’t be able to see them in such nice detail.
‘The Carpenter’s Shop in Nazareth’ late 18th c. Anon. Brooklyn Museum.
Because the painting is so dark the Brooklyn Museum provides a black and white copy to better see this frenetic workshop.
With non-winged personnel this may be a good representation of a colonial workshop cranking out furniture, doors and fittings for the non-stop construction of churches, private residences and governments buildings. There are two workbenches, both with face vises and a mystery.
Close-up shot of the bench in the middle of the painting. The white squares may be the vise screws (only this bench has these). But what are those mysterious things at each end of the vise? After much deep thought Chris surmised “rocks on strings.”
‘Taller de la Sagrada Familia’ 18th c. Anon. Location is Copacabana. Photo: ARCA.
Despite the camera flash there is a staked bench with a face vise.
Isolating the bench shows, unlike others, the face vise does not extend the length of the bench.
‘The Sagrada Familia y San Juanito’ 17th c. Anon. Photo: Jose Antonio Camara, Antiquarian, Madrid.
This painting is spectacular in its detail: the wood grain on the board held by Joseph, Mary’s sewing cushion with thimbles in one pocket and thread in the other, the cat under the table playing with a spool of thread and the scissors in the basket at Mary’s feet. Joseph works on a staked bench and behind him tools are arranged neatly on a rack.
You may have seen this image on Chris’ other blog. When I sent the image to him a few weeks ago he got a little crazy over the “doe’s foot” planing stop. Readers of this blog will recognize the planing stop as, ahem, the palm or ban qi, which originated in China. You can read the origin story of the palm here. The blog about the modern version of palm or ban qi can be found here.
The palm can hold a wide flat board in place on the bench or a board held on edge, and both without leaving a mark. So how did a bench appliance of Chinese origin get to 17th-century Alto Peru? The same way Asian workers and goods arrived: the Manila Galleons which sailed between Acapulco and Manila from 1565 to 1815. The palm is just one example of the early arrival of Asian techniques in the Americas.
You might be wondering who is that woman in the doorway, the one who has drawn the attention of the Holy Family. She holds a basin containing the Arma Christ, symbols of the Passion of Christ. In a European painting the woman might be Saint Ann, the mother of Mary. In this painting I believe she is Mama Ocllo, a mother figure from Inca legend who gave women the knowledge of spinning thread and weaving textiles. This is another example of Amerindian painters integrating their culture into Christian religious works.
The illustration is from “El primer nueva cronica y buen gobierno,” a publication from 1615 in the collection of the Royal Danish Library.
Argentina
I found only one workbench-related painting from Argentina.
The painting is from Cordoba and titled ‘El Hogar de Nazaret’ from 1609 by Juan Bautista Daniel (1585-1662). The bench is staked with a try plane resting at the far end. Most of the tools hang in a rack or on the wall.
The painting has long been in a private collection and this seems to be the only photograph available. The odd thing about it is Daniel is identified as a Dane in a plaque at the center-right edge of the painting. It turns out he was from Norway and arrived in the territory now known as Argentina in 1606. He made his way to Cordoba where he was granted permission to live and work.
Paraguay
The last stop on this Latin American tour is at Santa Rosa, one of the Jesuit missions in Paraguay known as “reducciones de indios.” It is also my favorite of all the Latin American paintings.
Photo by Fernando Allen Galiano on Portal Guarani.
The fresco is by an unknown artist and is in a corner of the Chapel of Our Lady of Loreto at the former Santa Rosa mission. The mission was founded in 1698 and populated by the indigenous Guarani people. When the Jesuits were forced out in 1767 the missions were deserted and most fell into ruin.
The fresco frames the Holy Family with two columns. Joseph is using a chisel and maul to make cuts on a panel for eight-point star inlays. The middle figure is Jesus sawing (ignore the splotch that looks like a wing), and on the end is Mary. In all the other paintings where we see Joseph with a chisel his action in generic. Is he chopping a mortise or carving? We don’t know. Here, we can see what Joseph is making.
The fresco is first of all an important document in the history of the Guarani. Second, it illustrates a craft that is an important element of colonial design.
Geometric designs were not new to the indigenous peoples of the Americas. Pre-conquest, geometric shapes were used in stonework, metal, textiles and pottery.
The stars, sun and moon were observed and recorded by many indigenous groups. Stars as a symbol, particularly eight-point stars, are found in many cultures. It is part of the Moorish influence in Spanish art and architecture, and in Christianity it is a symbol of redemption or baptism and is also a symbol of Jerusalem. For a sailor an eight-point star is a compass rose or wind rose.
On the left is part of a folio from the 8th century ‘Beato de Liebano’ and on the right Mary’s gown in a Cuzco School painting.
The eight-point star was used extensively as wood, mother of pearl and metal inlays in furniture during the colonial era. The examples above are from chests, armoires and tables made in various parts of the colonial territories. The black ceiling with red stars is the ceiling of the fresco chapel (in some grand European cathedrals the ceilings are painted blue with gold stars).
So, from a humble fresco in a small chapel that somehow survived for over 300 years we learn quite a lot.
To wrap-up this survey of workbenches I think the staked bench (high or low) with a planing stop and maybe a face vise is the type of bench that was most often used in the colonial era. The painters were not working in a vacuum and only copying scenes from European engravings and paintings. They observed carpenters that arrived from Spain and the benches they built and used, benches that could be adapted for different construction needs. Also, some of the first secular paintings, the Casta paintings from Mexico, were not copies of European paintings and show this type of staked bench.
A Quick Tour of Tool Storage
You have seen tools on the ground, on the floor, in racks and shelves on the wall and stowed in baskets. All of these methods, or non-storage in the case of floor/ground, can be seen in European paintings. How did the woodworkers in the colonial era store there tools? Spanish-born carpenters probably brought their tools in small chests or wrapped in bags. Using baskets would also be a familiar method of storage.
Making baskets was a well-known craft in the New World. In the wedding scene above from the Codex Mendoza, an Aztec document from 1535, there are woven mats and a basket.
This lidded basket is from the pre-Inca Chancay society and dated 12th to 14th century (British Museum). It holds yarns and tools used by a weaver.
If you had a small collection of tools and needed a tough but lightweight storage and carrying solution, a basket would certainly fit the bill.
There is one other solution and possible only with the help of the angels: the sky rack.
This is an excerpt from “Chairmaker’s Notebook” written and illustrated by Peter Galbert.
When I set out to make my first chair, there were parts of the process that I did not even know existed. But there was one part that I knew I wanted to do: carve the seat.
I got into woodworking for this kind of fun. Watching the shavings fly as the seat shape comes into focus is hypnotic and thrilling. Making a chair should begin with the various green wood parts so that they will be dry when the seat carving is done, but I suspect that most folks head right to the seat carving and build the rest of the chair around it. And when I started out, I was no exception. I couldn’t even wait to build an actual chair, so I glued up a bunch of 2x4s and used a gouge and a bent piece of steel to hog out a crude seat.
Beyond referring to a seat as oval-, D- or shield- shaped, it actually is an “un-nameable” shape. While it has hollows and humps that follow a distinct logic, there is no simple way to describe it. I think of it as a landscape, full of hills and valleys. To arrive at this complex shape in a consistent and timely way requires a set of steps, each one paving the way for the next. No single step is ambiguous; in the end, the overall shape, while tough to describe, is consistent and clear.
Carving the seat affects just about every surface of the workpiece, so being able to hold the seat in a number of positions is critical. I always leave the extra material adjoining the back of the seat in place until the last step of carving the underside at the back. This way, I can always clamp the waste area without dinging the soft pine, and when I clamp it to the corner of my bench, I can easily move around the seat to come in from the desired direction.
Clamping the work to carve the seat.
Before I carve under the front edge of the seat, I can clamp the seat between the vise’s dog and a bench dog because the material being compressed gets carved away later. For the initial adze work, I clamp the seat to my shavehorse, which puts the blank at a comfortable height to use the small hand adze that I prefer.
I’ve also had great success using a podium-type support that sits on my bench. This is great when using the small hand adze because you can flip the seat in various orientations without having to move clamps, plus the force of the blows is countered by the lip at the bottom of the holding platform.
When Steel Meets Wood –Tips for Clean Cuts
Once you’ve begun to envision the wood as a bundle of fibers and understand how a tool is configured to cut them, it’s time to put these two bits of knowledge together to get proper results. Regardless of which type of tool you are using, it’s important to know there is always a technique that can deliver clean, controlled cuts.
Clean results when carving are usually achieved by moving or pointing the tool in a specific direction. Cutting in the wrong direction usually leads to rough and uncontrollable results as the tool slips between the fibers and causes the wood to split in advance of the cutter.
In the chapter Shaving & Shaping Parts, I introduced shaving, which is like controlled splitting, but for now, let’s focus on achieving clean cuts when cutting across the fibers.
Looking back to the structure of the wood, it’s important to note that any time you see a surface pattern other than long strips running perfectly from one end of the board to the other, you are looking at exposed end grain. This is the common “cathedral” patterning seen on the surface of most sawn boards. Because the surface has exposed end grain, a specific direction of cut will yield good results.
Learn to read the bers of boards. Anywhere that the lines on the surface curve or angle in relation to the surfaces, there is exposed end grain. Cutting into exposed end grain can cause a split to run beneath the surface.
Most folks encounter this concept when deciding which direction to plane a board. I think of planing a board as a form of carving because the same rules of grain direction apply – you are simply “carving” a flat shape.
When planing a board, the direction that the fibers ascend from the lower face determines the best direction to plane the surface. This is usually referred to as cutting “downhill.”
When pushed “uphill,” the cutting edge slides between the fibers, follows them and causes a splitting action to occur ahead of the cutter. The damage is limited by the depth of cut, the sole and the chipbreaker, but the increased effort and diminished surface quality are not desirable.
How to plane “downhill” (bottom image) by following the fibers in a board.
A favorite comparison when contemplating planing is to think of petting a cat or dog. If you stroke the fur from head to tail, it lies down smoothly and your hand never slips down to the skin. If you pet from tail to head, your hand slides under the fur, causing the fibers to stand up and the animal to get annoyed. I’m pretty sure we’ve all had a cat and board glare back at us after such a transgression.
While you can determine the direction of cut based on the orientation of the growth rings and the pattern on the faces and edges of the board, this can lead to confusion because boards from twisted or bowed logs can have multiple direction changes on each surface. In such cases a few light cuts are best to help determine the best cutting direction for each area.
