Gourd Techniques I Want to Try

I have been busy, busy making more gourd creations for a coming craft show as well as custom made orders. I am eager to finish with them and start on another batch. I think I have the gourd bug back! Currently, I am working on around 14 gourds. I'm not sure why, but I really enjoy doing so many at one time. I would like to share all of them with you, but for right now I have been thinking about that second batch of gourds I want to work on. I've been browsing the gourding world this morning and came across techniques that I want to try!

Making carved areas of gourd look like wood is something that may not be such a big feat to accomplish, but it's been on my mind. I've seen this done by Bonnie Gibson and today I discovered James Preston also dabbled in this technique. See his branches below:

 Bonnie Gibson does it differently, but she manages to make it look like wood around the eagle:

James Preston again left me wanting to try something new. This time I want to try smoothing out my relief carvings and giving them the look of the outer shell of the gourd as he did with the maple leaves on his purse.

 I see it done by so many gourd artists and its something I'd like to finally try myself: Chip carving, both with a knife and a u-gouge. Jenn Avery embellishes many of her woodburnings with chip carving.

 

Making wall art with gourds opens up new gourd avenues, I think. Gourd artist, Neal Greene, specializes in southwestern patterns and colors, but I think gourd wall art can be embellished with many other themes and influences.

I am always looking for new ways to embellish the backgrounds of my gourds and Mark Doolittle has "done much" with woodburning and dyeing to make it look like a mosaic of beautiful stonework.  This is just one background technique that I want to try.

There are lots of weaving techniques that can be used to embellish gourds, but teneriffe is one that I'd like to try first.

Tooling is a technique that for some reason I seem to fancy even though it is more of a western, south western themed embellishment. Perhaps I can put a mid-western twist on it. :) 

I can't understand why I haven't done it yet, but I haven't made gourd jewelry. My sister, Catherine, makes all sorts of jewelry so you would think I'd dabble in it myself. Nope. That means I have to now.

Okay, I have done lots of painting over the years, but I really want to practice doing a large realistic painting of something very special. It's just one of my gourding goals - perhaps a lake scene, a farm scene, garden scene, something near and dear.

 
I have used several gourds to create one unique piece many times before, but I have been imagining creating something spectacular!

Lastly, clay sculpting is a technique I have been wanting to do for years! Why haven't I? I feel intimidated. However, I really want to practice and teach myself some sculpting skills - so I hope my determination will get the best of me and I'll go for it!

© 2013 Bernadette Fox