THE MAKING OF ART

Matt Heim, furniture-maker and main artist, along with David Gosse and Tim Jorgensen are co-owners of WoodLab. They were commissioned by Idaho resident Nancy Williams to recreate a photo of the Teton landscape out of hand-selected wood, epoxy, and paint.

They scoured the inventory of slabs to find a large piece that would translate well to the photograph once carved and poured. Next, they created a photo-to-slab image for a digital comp for approval. In this case, the client provided a lot of specific detail to dial in the digital comp. “We sculpted the wood to create the mountains, the foothills, the river, and the foreground. The Tetons were the focal point of the photo since this is the view out her back door,” mentioned Gosse.

BY TIA MARKLAND-CRABTREE

The process involved stencils that they transfered to the wood. This allowed them to stain the wood and keep the individual stain colors from bleeding into each other. Once the wood was sculpted, sanded, stenciled, and stained, they begin the complex layering of the epoxy pours to give it dimension. Some element, such as the clouds, were done separately and then layered into the epoxy pours. “We wanted the 3D nature of the sculpture to be emphasized and noticeable without looking unrealistic. This is a 3D sculpture encased/suspended in epoxy,” said Heim.

The vision and art were immeasurably complex and took over six months to create. The creative process required dozens of intricate pours which each took many days to cure before the next layer could be poured. “It was a long process and well worth it. It’s the most eye-catching piece. Nancy was nice enough to let us show it off for a while,” says Heim. “This is definitely a masterpiece”, “This is a true work of art”, and “I’ve never seen anything like it” are a few of the comments they hear from admirers.