Artist`s passion is a craft less common
Tom Dunkle’s wood carvings featured at Ritter Public Library
Tom Dunkle doesn’t do it for riches or for ego.
“I do it for the looks on people’s faces,” said the Vermilion artist of the rich-looking, multihued works of art he creates from a cornucopia of wood.
Like the sheer delight on the face of the little girl for whom he created a polished wood teddy bear.
Or the child who received a detailed likeness of TV’s Shaggy and Scooby-Doo.
“I’ve probably got 100 pieces sitting around,” said the tall, dark-haired, affable man.
Smiling as he enthusiastically discussed his hobby, Dunkle said he doesn’t create his art to make money.
“I’d rather just wait and have them go to the right person,” he said.
Known as Intarsia, Dunkle’s style of art is less common than the oil paintings, jewelry and photography that are art show staples.
But it’s no less beautiful. And it’s the product of a few simple tools — a scroll saw and belt sander.
The public will get the chance to judge Dunkle’s handiwork this weekend when he’s the featured artist at the sixth annual Friends of Ritter Public Library art show.
An art form dating to the 15th century, intarsia is a mosaic of wood fitted and glued into a supporting wooden frame with a thin wood backing. Dunkle’s pieces are a mix of original designs and those he buys from pattern books.
The highly polished woods he uses can be found in what Dunkle calls the “exotic woods” sections of most lumber stores, with names like bloodwood rose, zebrawood and honey locust.
Most colors can be found naturally in woods, but the blues and greens found on some of his more whimsical pieces are the marriage of maple wood and food coloring.
One of Dunkle’s larger pieces is a heavy bald eagle with a 40-inch wingspan made from black walnut.
And he’s produced even larger pieces that include an elaborate, 300-piece fire engine complete with dalmatians, and one called “Bustin’ Loose,” an action tableau of two cowboys working to break a wild horse. That one measures more than 4 feet.
“I do this all winter long,” said Dunkle, spreading his hands to show the roughed-up fingers that are a byproduct of all that time spent using a sander.
When he’s not working with wood, Dunkle is the owner of a
He admits that some of the most difficult and time-consuming pieces turn out to be “the prettiest in the long run.”
The Friends of Ritter Library art show usually draws 40 to 50 artists, but may have fewer this year as a result of the concurrent “Branching Out” art show being staged by the Art Guild of Vermilion, said Joette McDonald, an organizer of both art shows. The library show will highlight most artists working in visual media, ranging from watercolors and oils to decoupage, mixed-media, stained glass, pen and ink drawings, wall hangings and photography.
“We usually have a very good display of photography,” said McDonald. “We have a number of excellent photographers in Vermilion.”
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