Thread: Bring out your dead!

Originally Posted by Drillit

I think, regrettably, you are largely correct. The root cause of the problem is that
turning is no longer recognized by the education authorities as a stand alone or integral to a trade course. (closure of Lidcombe TAFE)
Drillit.

Originally Posted by artme

I think many in my age group acquired a taste for manual arts at school and always had a yearn to do something along those lines.

Originally Posted by hughie

The main contender seems to be that wood turning is not mainstream anything. Hand turned are generally imported due to cost, totally forget the quality aspect. Its all about price.

If you look at Google stats you will find that there only a few places where wood turning is practiced with any serious numbers around the world. Australia and New Zealand, The UK and North America. These are the major areas and if you want to sell your 'wood turned art' North America is the only continent that has any serious numbers of collectors.

With the move to automation etc has just about done the wood turner in. Oh there will always a few who will be turning by hand for a living, but the market wont tolerate too many of them.

The other thing is 'perception', the perception seems to be its what old men do in their declining years.

But despair not, there a small band of appreciative collectors [ well in Sydney anyway] that will be happy to buy the 'wood turned art' for a reasonable price. Hopefully they will grow in number and in appreciation of the craft.

The above quotes sum up some of my thoughts.

I'm late 50's and have always worked with wood in some form. Some of my earliest memories are about "working" with Dad, then watching my Grandpa "fix" things, my uncles making plywood flatties and just loving watching anything being hand made by tradesman and craftsman. Then there were the women in my life that sewed our clothes, baked cakes, made tapestries, needlework etc. Even watching Johnson's / Rankine Bro's saw mills, Rankine's & Capricornia's rotary veneer mills, Winkworth's joinery etc in Cairns as a boy allowed me to see and value how things had a large and skilled human component in their manufacture. How various men worked at their trades to make a sawmill work, how the loggers, carters, yard hands, benchmen, sawyers, saw doctors, tallymen even the clerks all had a role to play.

Sadly mostly because of "health & safety" the generations that have followed us have not been allowed to see the workings of mills, to sense the noise, smells, atmosphere or the team work and camaraderie involved in making things from base materials to finished hand crafted works of art or utilitarian pieces. My son now near 30 had the opportunity to experience some of what I have seen, but the younger ones don't even have any opportunity to experience "manual arts" in the schools now.

Regrettably now the production of food and the making of objects is so remote from the end user that it is of little value to them how an object is made as price and availability become the differentiators for them and heck you can see in a one minute YouTube clip how things are made.

Most have no desire to "make" things anymore as they have not been schooled to develop the patience and temperament or to acquire the basic hand skills or “common knowledge” about making things. It becomes a very steep learning curve for many.

Thanks for starting this post artful bodger. Really interesting discussion.

I'm 38 and work an office job. I have a workshop at home due to a keen interest in working with my hands and making stuff. Helps to bring me some life balance; work pays the bills and offers some job satisfaction, making things at home and doing projects lets me achieve more tangible things that others and myself can appreciate. I'm no expert on the tools, just your typical DIYer (learn from mistakes, that kind of thing).

Anyway, in the past when reading DIY/Woodworking material (books, magazines, internet) I always skipped Woodturning articles - I thought it was daggy/old/a past time at best. My wife saw an adult education course (in Tasmania) on offer earlier this year, just a beginners course. There aren't many woodworking courses around (apart from full time stuff) so I thought 'why not'. Fair dinkum I fell in love with it straight away. To take a block of wood and turn it into something with only a lathe and a gouge is poetry in motion. Now I can't read enough material on woodturning. I'm currently attending a follow up course (continuing on from the original course earlier this year).

I agree with others sentiments that not many of our friends/families are into woodturning. The only people I have come across are those at markets or speciality tool stores.

The good thing is we can play a part in making sure this art doesn't die off. I think with all the focus on technology/gadgets etc that people forget about the more simple things in life. I detest the new 3D printers and laser cutting machines. Argh! I also feel that there's massive opportunity for more imagination and creativity to be explored in wood turning. Often local markets just sell the same old traditional stuff - same shaped bowls, same shaped pepper grinder, same shaped......

The other thing I have learnt is that woodturning ain't cheap. Lathes, chisels, sharpening system, DE, safety equipment, wood, sandpaper, then other stuff like bandsaws, chainsaws etc. This would be a blocker for many (space& cost).

I also think a big opportunity is to get people interested in woodturned items. Let's face it, not everyone will want to be or can be a woodturner. Appealing to current markets and how people beautify their homes is something to align items to.

Anyway, I'm only new to woodturning, but looking forward to many years of wood chips flying from my chisels and keeping the art alive!

Just from my perspective most of the schools no longer offer woodworking. When I was young the local Boys Club also had a woodworking shop and instructors (normally 10-16 y.o)

I love woodworking but it gets harder all the time to wrestle 4X8 sheets of plywood by myself. Turning is so much less physically demanding unless you are doing huge items. You can also take a lathe off site easily if it is a mini/midi lathe, not so easy with a table saw.

I have been following this thread with interest. I have been involved in turning since I was about 10, I am now 74 and still turning. I taught wood turning at the local T.A.F.E. for about 18 years before retiring, mostly to adult recreational turners. In the past ten years or so, there has a proliferation of week end turning activities. Many of the attendees are predominately retired or close to it. But there is still a sprinkling of "youngsters". Probably the hurdles for these activities is the time and cost imposed on young families.

The cost involved in acquiring a lathe and necessary additions can be a hurdle. Generally there is not a lot of spare resources to "invest" in turning gear. Most of the older people have had time to "acquired" their gear over a longer period and have taken advantage of "opportunities" as they crop up, as well as having the time to devote to using their gear.

Generally, it has been my experience, that teenagers that do show an interest in turning, lose that interest when the urge to satisfy basic human urges kick in. Then there is the added expense of a vehicle and the cost of socializing that seems to absorb surplus funds. We have all had those difficulties. Now comes the family raising, and so on. This process has been, and will be around for a long time.

Weekend workshops and clubs seem to be well attended, I think the future of recreational wood turning will continue for a while yet. However as a profession the future at present looks bleak.

Just as I see it at present.

Jim

I guess I'm one of the lucky ones employed to turn 3 days a week if it comes in! And turn the arty craft stuff at home.
The building industry needs a federation boom again, before I get to old!

Back to the original post title.

When my young bloke was about 4 he saw the bring out your dead bit in the Monty Python movie and then he rolled himself up in a small carpet and yelled out "look Daddy bring out the dead" so I picked him up wrapped in the carpet and ran through the house yelling "Bring out the dead". Outside I unrolled the carpet so he tipped out onto the lawn. He thought this was a great game and used to do it a couple of times a day.

It was a bit disconcerting when we had polite company and he would ask them to get off the carpet because we needed it to "bring out the dead".

And now onto the OT. A few months back I presented at an annual gathering of WA wood turners and noted the few % of non-grey headed members.

Personally I suspect that those of us who are 'into' turning are aware that there are still turners of all ages out there.

However it's the clubs - which seem to be predominantly the older turners (and those who have taken up the hobby since retirement!) - which run public events and demonstrations at fetes, etc. to promote turning... hence most non-turners seem to associate turning with the Grey Brigade.

This is not true, it's just the public perception.

A bit like the bloke who was all outraged that "all of the farmers I've ever met are elderly and near retirement. The guvmint should do something about getting younger people interested!"

When asked where he met 'all these farmers' his reply was "Bingo night at the Upper Kumbucka RSL."

Well I am only 80!! 3-4 years ago I had a chance to buy a General 25-200 M1, two Oneway chucks, and jumbo jaws for $500. All almost new. I had been woodworking as a hobby for years but boy has it been a blast! Over that time frame I have turned over 200 bowls in the 5" to 11" range ( mostly 6-9" ) and have enough material kicking around to turn over 500 bowls in BL maple, cherry, dogwood, acacia, butternut & doubt whether I will get to finish them at my age. I have taken to turning down wood!!! In that time I may have sold 2 dozen, given away many & have quite a collection!
Sooner or later I will have to quit because of lung problems & would encourage ALL AGES to wear good breathing protection, & have a good dust collection system.

Cheers. Ron.

Personally I think it is better to start a hobby long before retiring. It gives you a better understanding of where you would like to be with the hobby when you retire as the initial cost can be quite high for any hobby not just wood turning.

At the wood turning club that I attend the majority are retired and I might be the second or third youngest. We do not have a club house so our meetings are at people's houses, so that might be a factor for the younger people.

Personally I don't think of this as an art that is dying. I believe it needs to be promoted a little better and more people will have a better understanding of wood turning. The internet(library) as large as it is offers this opportunity for people to expand their knowledge. And I am not just talking about wood turning now, I am talking about everything. If you want to know about paper, nuts, pens, sound, carpet, dogs, cats, lizards, history, and the list goes on.

It should not be just via the internet to promote it can also be by interaction with one another.