Exhibitor’s Choice Award at 2012 Western Design Conference!
I premiered my latest furniture creation at the 2012 WDC in Jackson, Wyoming, where I won one of the Exhibitor’s Choice Awards! It is such an honor to have the respect of other artists–the place was full of amazing work! Thus, it is not surprising that we had a four way tie for “Exhibitor’s Choice.” Thanks to all who came and supported it, the WDC staff and all the great artists. I’m already looking forward to next year and tearing up the dance floor at the Wort and Cowboy again with my fellow artists after a long day “behaving” at the show. 😉
Prairie Sentinel Buffet
Solid wood construction using reclaimed materials: barn wood, barbed wire, old hand-hewn cedar fence posts, antique nails and steel. The barbed wire is Michael Kelley’s “Thorny Fence,” the first to be patented, 1868. The door pulls are square nails, torch heated and shaped into pulls. All carcass joinery is mortise and tenon, and frame and panel, with handcut dovetails for the cherry drawer. The steel panels are streaked with a custom patina. The piece is finished with a polymerized tung oil.
The design is evocative of the short-grass prairie. Fence lines arise from the vast expanse of the golden grasslands delineating checkerboard boundaries and containing herds of cattle. Below the surface, life is deep and rich with ground squirrels, nesting night hawks, countless insects, and the deep, determined roots of prairie grasses, stretching down to reach secret aquifers below.