Martin Wenham

Quotation cut into an offcut of
hand-sawn oak

House sign (above right) cut in
oak with the letters painted
black afterwards.

One of a set of samples to show
the sharpness that can be
obtained with a hard fine¬
grained wood.

It was difficult to know how to present Martin's work
as he is in a different position from the other
contributors. He is not at all a full-time craftsman,
being a school teacher by profession. However, his
distinctively personal approach to woodcarved
inscriptions should interest those wanting to try out
this medium. Although he has never had any training
and has worked entirely alone, Martin has been
interested in using letters since his schooldays.

He feels that the choice of quotations is a
fundamental part of lettering: 'Craftsmen have a
responsibility to ensure that their efforts and the
attention of their readers are not wasted on the
exquisite presentation of trivia.'

He presents wood as a warm, sympathetic material
for informal and domestic situations. The useful part of
his work, as he calls it, 'is carrying information in a
clear and, I hope, beautiful way. Good wood signs can
be made relatively cheaply and add significantly to the
quality of the environment'.

HAYFÏGLD
COTXA.G €

Martin cuts by 'stabbing vertically into the centre line
to the full depth of the letter, then chopping out the
waste with a diagonally downward movement of chisel
or gouge to give the familiar 60° v-section.' Based on
his feeling that the tough fibrous nature of wood
favours simple, open letters, he has evolved a simple
basic alphabet that he describes as 'rustic' (though not
in the historic sense). He also feels that 'The technical
limitations of wood offer none of the freedom of
working with a fine stone such as slate, though its
colour and texture open up possibilities in other
directions.'

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Notice how the shape of the
hawthorn wood and the knot
influence the layout of this
quotation.

The letters were roughly
sketched out in a straight line
and counted before being
transferred on to wood, where
they were freely adapted to the
movement of the branch. The
distortion of the letters by the
position of the knot added force
to this quotation by Lao Tzu.

[ѵ-ЛѴ'*' \ i V ■ '■ ¡J

ivo on

An apt coupling of a poem by
Gael Turnbull, with roughly
sawn oak. This piece was
carved for an instrument maker
in exchange for a lute

"~ V****M*

With this quotation, designed
for an international peace
exhibition, Martin is giving
more thought to his actual
letters. He is using a range of
scale and form to emphasize the
message.

81