Turned-wood bowls as an art form - a rather novel concept. On the other hand, since wood bowls have been around for three thousand years, maybe it's not as novel as it seems.
James Prestini, currently professor emeritus of Design at the University of California, Berkeley, pioneered the idea that the wooden bowl could be of aesthetic value. Prestini took up wood-turning as hobby in Chicago, seeking to explore new forms in sculpture during the years of unemployment following the completion of his B.C. in Mechanical Engineering at Yale University in 1930. At this point, wood-turning had become a largely mechanized process practiced only by a few craftsmen. Prestini abandoned wood for steel as a medium for his art in the 1950s because he was "tried of making circles." Although steel is a more versatile material, Prestini said that it lacks the friendly quality of wood, which is what appealed to him when he started wood-turning. Some recent developments in the field of wood-turning have left this first generation wood-turner somewhat disenchanted. He contends that in their attempt to make the turned-wood bowl into a high art form, some artists are denying the quality of the wood and trying to work with it as if it were a more flexible material such as glass. "It should express the qualities of wood…not imitate those of glass," he said.
It cannot be denied that the turned-wood bowl has undergone dramatic changes since its recent inception during the 1930s, and especially after the 1970s. The word "bowl" is probably an inadequate term to describe the creations artist have produced with a lathe and block of wood. David Ellsworth, president of the American Association of Woodturners and an artist who has been described as nudging the edge of his field, has said that "vessel" might be a more appropriate term.
The results of these developments can be seen on display at the Renwick Gallery in Washington, D.C., until September 28. The collection of eighty-three bowls produced by twenty artists from all over the United States, plus one artist from Ontario, Canada, belongs to Edward Jacobson, an attorney who lives in Phoenix, Arizona. In the past, Jacobson has participated in the display of collections of American Indian and African art for the Heard Museum in Arizona. He found collecting and promoting wood bowls as an art form particularly rewarding because the art form is so new and because it has been so well received by prominent artists.
Jacobson began collecting turned wood bowls when he purchased, in 1977, a tiger-striped Georgia Pine bowl turned by artisan Ed Moulthrop at The Hand and Spirit, a craft shop in Scottsdale, Arizona.
"I have always related to wood. Most men relate to wood, and some women," he said, pointing out that out of the nearly one hundred bowls on display, not one was carved by a female turner, Jacobson said a principal reason for this unusual occurrence is that most men have taken shop class in junior high and high school where they learn to work with wood and a lathe - an experience most women were more likely to have missed.
As a result, public schools are probably the most influential institution in the field of woodturning, since the art is too new to have made much of an appearance in college and art school curricula. There is only one school, located in San Bernardino, California, where a degree
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