Last meeting
Visitors to this month's meeting included 2 spouses, Carolyn Stern and Nancy Barnby. Program Chair Jay Perrine announced next month's meeting with Professor John Schelley of the US Forest Products Lab. In Oct we will go to our Foster City meeting place for Jigs and Fixtures. We'll return there in December for our annual Holiday Party --- which will be held on the SECOND Thursday of that month due to the upcoming holiday. Membership Chair Robbie Fanning said we have one new member, Greg Rice. Treasurer Don Stern reports approximately $2,300 in the treasury. Call Outreach Chair Bill Henzel (650/349-3062) if you can host a Toy Workshop. Volunteers are desperately needed if we are to reach our goal of the number of toys by the end of the year. He's also looking for volunteers to help as team leaders in building a 280 sq. ft. shed for the San Mateo Boys and Girls Club in Sept or Oct. Speaking of Toy Workshops, see the Upcoming Events section in this Newsletter. Since the meeting was for a very limited time and was held outside, there was no Show & Tell.
Last month's meeting: presentation
Susanne Weaver, Curator of Arts and Crafts at the Oakland Museum in, a brief introduction to the museum, spoke about her role there and her part in curating this exhibit of the furniture of Gary Knox Bennett. She explained that the Oakland Museum (a.k.a. The People's Museum) has always been receptive to displaying crafts in addition to the fine arts. We were then ushered into the exhibit for a talk by Gary Knox Bennett.
In came this huge bundle of enthusiasm and energy. Mr. Knox Bennett is very tall person (6'7") with a wonderfully large personality. He said he couldn't wait to talk to us, because "I could 'splain s__t!" And 'splain he did! He has had a varied career, once serving as a chauffeur for the Beatles at their Bay Area concert. He studied photographs of them to tell them apart. Alas, he drove the decoy car. He said he always wanted to be an artist. He started at CCAC in the '50s as a painter and then switched to sculpture. He received a good academic background in art, particularly 3D art. In the '60s he started a roach clip company called Squirkenworks. You can read all about this and his other exploits on the wall of the exhibit space, or by buying his new book --- a beautiful coffee table affair called "The Furniture of Gary Knox Bennett." At the same time Gary was making jewelry, but eventually he did a piece of furniture (a table) for a friend. Soon, Gary wasmaking more and more furniture, all of it arresting the viewer's attention in some way. Either through the use of materials ("Glass loves epoxy!"), their placement ("Break a rule. See what happens. Break another rule."), the finish ("Burn (torch) and brush, then oil it"), or the sometimes highly intricate connection details (the tops of his trestle tables are in held in constant compression by a "spring rail" of his design underneath), Gary's pieces get your attention.
In the late '70s the editor of Fine Woodworking, John Kelsey reviewed Gary's work and put Gary's now infamous cabinet-with-a-nail-in-the-face-of-it on the back cover of the magazine. Gary says, "At that time I didn't know ___ about woodworking." But nevertheless the quality of his work and of his unique ideas showed through enough to generate a buzz around the country for his work. This helped him get noticed and he was off and running with furniture.
In school he tested high in isometric projection, but he doesn't draw now, except to draw his ideas right on the wood right before he cuts it. He sometimes paints it white first to facilitate this. He also combines metal and other materials into his pieces. He knows how to work with these other materials. For example to rout aluminum he uses tallow to lubricate the edge he's going to cut and just takes off a little at a time with a carbide tipped router bit. He also cuts brass and aluminum with a standard bandsaw blade. He says it's important when working with metal that the blade not only must be exactly 90 degrees to the table when measured at the side of the blade, but also when measured at the back of the blade. He also cautions to always "allow for an escape of the material" when cutting metal. He also casts metal parts for his furniture, hence the bronze legs and other pieces.
At Gary's invitation, after the exhibit talk many of us went to see his shop and talk further at his house. Everything in Gary's shop is large, like Gary and his furniture. For instance he has a 30" wide jointer and a 24" planer. Even so the interplay of ideas expressed in the form, color, and composition of his work is complicated, yet simple. Above all his work, like Gary himself, is FUN! Thanks Gary for sharing your work and experience with us and for the post exhibit party at your home and studio! Also thanks to Susanne for meeting with us at the Museum and allowing us to view Gary's work. If there were any "jaded" woodworkers when they came in, they were "rarin'" to go when they came out.
By Craig Mineweaser - Secretary