Post by Doc Barranti on Jul 17, 2013 0:24:29 GMT -5
Being a full time Shuckmaker was a longtime dream for me. As many of you know, this past September I made the leap from part time to full time Hidestretcher. To be able to pursue a career with sixguns and shucks is pretty darn cool, and I know that I am a lucky guy to love what I do and do what I love.
Going way back, I have always been considered by others to be artistic. I have a little trouble calling myself an ‘artist’, though I wouldn’t have a problem calling myself ‘creative’. My creativity can manifest itself in many things: the lines of a new holster, my deck with built-in benches, the roof I added to the deck, the way I cut my grass…. The list can go on….
I tend to be a thinker; Fermin calls it daydreaming…I call it engineering. I’m pretty sure I get that from Dad. Dad was a thinker; a sketch on a napkin became a remodeled basement or a greenhouse. Whether through genetics or learned by watching him, I am blessed, or cursed, with being a creative thinker.
My days start early in my shop, and usually end late. It isn’t unusual for me to be working long after my friends in the central and mountain time zones have called it a night. It is usually late into the evening, when I like to take a break from my worklog and do something creative. Prototypes and special projects seem to come together effortlessly during these late night candle burning sessions.
Thoughts and images of Sixgunner Legends, Cowboys and Heros are always present in my mind. We all read classic Elmer and Skeeter, watch John Wayne and constantly search for the next Ronald Reagan. We long for the days of the cowboy code, and of lawmen that stood straight and were true gunfighters.
These thoughts and images bounce around in my head all day while working, and it’s during the late hours of the night that I choose to let some of those images take shape…on leather. While leather is not nearly as forgiving as paper and pencil are, it does add depth and dimension to a portrait that is not possible on paper or canvas.
Shown here are several of the carvings that I have done in the quiet of the night (these are done well after business hours; I don’t take time away from my customers orders). Hopefully you will recognize these characters. The cowboy in the bottom right carving is our own Madbo, the Mad Bohemian in his previous life. I call it Madbo, 1880. The second photo will give you an idea of the scale of these carvings.
Who will be my next subject? That’s a good question, but being a thinker, I’m sure I’ll figure it out…Thanks for looking!
Going way back, I have always been considered by others to be artistic. I have a little trouble calling myself an ‘artist’, though I wouldn’t have a problem calling myself ‘creative’. My creativity can manifest itself in many things: the lines of a new holster, my deck with built-in benches, the roof I added to the deck, the way I cut my grass…. The list can go on….
I tend to be a thinker; Fermin calls it daydreaming…I call it engineering. I’m pretty sure I get that from Dad. Dad was a thinker; a sketch on a napkin became a remodeled basement or a greenhouse. Whether through genetics or learned by watching him, I am blessed, or cursed, with being a creative thinker.
My days start early in my shop, and usually end late. It isn’t unusual for me to be working long after my friends in the central and mountain time zones have called it a night. It is usually late into the evening, when I like to take a break from my worklog and do something creative. Prototypes and special projects seem to come together effortlessly during these late night candle burning sessions.
Thoughts and images of Sixgunner Legends, Cowboys and Heros are always present in my mind. We all read classic Elmer and Skeeter, watch John Wayne and constantly search for the next Ronald Reagan. We long for the days of the cowboy code, and of lawmen that stood straight and were true gunfighters.
These thoughts and images bounce around in my head all day while working, and it’s during the late hours of the night that I choose to let some of those images take shape…on leather. While leather is not nearly as forgiving as paper and pencil are, it does add depth and dimension to a portrait that is not possible on paper or canvas.
Shown here are several of the carvings that I have done in the quiet of the night (these are done well after business hours; I don’t take time away from my customers orders). Hopefully you will recognize these characters. The cowboy in the bottom right carving is our own Madbo, the Mad Bohemian in his previous life. I call it Madbo, 1880. The second photo will give you an idea of the scale of these carvings.
Who will be my next subject? That’s a good question, but being a thinker, I’m sure I’ll figure it out…Thanks for looking!
