National Exhibition 1999

Principal Sponsors - The Art Veneers Company & Midlands Electricity

Below are just a few of the exhibits that were on show - there were over 300 of them in all. Many more can be seen on the Marquetry Society web site - get there via Links.

Comments are by Group Secretary Quentin Smith.

Left: Detail from Peter White's "Watching Paint Dry" which won the Premier class and took the Rosebowl for best exhibit in show. In addition, this picture also won the Artistic Merit Award.

Of particular note, apart from Peter's faultless cutting, is the subtle use of sand-shading. Each pebble has been individually cut and then dipped into hot sand. The resulting scorching gives a shadow effect which enhances the apparent roundness of the pebble. Notice too the small twigs and the way their fine shadows curve around the pebbles. Marquetry is not all about fine detail though - the inside of the paint tin is made from just two pieces of veneer and each paintbrush handle is a single piece.

Below: Staffordshire Marquetry Group member John Jeggo deservedly won the Advanced class and the H. Pedder Portraiture award for his picture "Chief Ten Bears".

Below Left: John also had success in the Three-Veneers class, his "Queen of the Jungle" being narrowly beaten into second place. The three veneers he used were European olive, walnut burr and a figured holly.

 

Left: Patrick Levins's "Woodland Harmony" pushed Peter White hard in the Premier Class. Note the extensive use of burrs to represent the foliage and the angled grain of the "sky" veneer to represent shafts of sunlight breaking through the trees.

This picture won the Art Veneers Trophy for the best use of veneers, though quite a few visitors favoured Tig McCaig's "Eilean Donan Castle" Below Left:

 

 

This picture is unusual in having a sky NOT made from a single piece of veneer. Cutting clouds into a picture often doesn't work well, but Tig shows that with careful selection of figure and colour a very dramatic effect can be achieved.

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