a carver
There are many reasons why we choose to live in this lovely land that we all call home. Some of us are born here whilst others such as Elle, spent her family holidays here year on year and looked for a way in the future to return. With those thoughts set in her mind, it wasn’t too long before the chance to come back here presented itself in the way of a Fine Arts degree at Falmouth University.
Throughout a degree such as fine art, Elle told me that the course opens up to whatever creative elements you connect with and for her that was carving, However, it wasn’t until a year after finishing her degree that she chose to specialise in carving.
Now, I wasn’t really sure what a carver was, so Elle was good enough to explain for me in detail, “I would say the term carver relates to the process of making the work, you could be a carver but not necessarily see yourself as an artist. Whereas I would consider myself an artist first and foremost and then carving is how I express my ideas”.
“I am super passionate about teaching the skills I have learnt to others”
Elle’s choice of materials to work with are predominantly stone with the addition of some wood. She works mainly with the softer stones such as soap stone, limestone and some sandstone but does work with harder stones such as granite, cornish I might add, for client based commissions. Elle told me “Stone is a little easier to manipulate the shape you want, whereas the woods grain has some control over the form. “
Carving for Elle is a full time occupation as she informs me that it can never really be part time.
In addition to her Cornwall based work, she’s been fortunate enough to travel to the likes of Latvia to compete in an ice carving festival and then a six week French trip where she assisted a sculptor working for a large limestone monolith carving, for a project called “Les Lapidialas.”
So where do we find Elle today? Well, she’s in the process of finishing her Masters in fine art at Central Saint Martins. Alongside that, she’s started her own carving workshops and by her own confession she’s passionate about teaching the skills she’s learnt and passing those skills onto others.
Her place of work is light and airy. Shooting her that day was easy as we were gifted with quality Cornish sunshine. Watching Elle work and the skills involved in carving looked effortless to me but that was clearly down to her wealth of experience in the mediums she chooses to work with.
Thanks Elle. RD
