Alexander Grabovetskiy, woodcarver, School of Woodcarving · Published 2023
What does the final assessment of the Grinling Gibbons course ask for?
Quick answer: The final assessment of the Grinling Gibbons course is a single photograph of your finished panel, uploaded as a jpg or png on the lesson page. Shrink the file first with TinyPNG and have it ready, since you get one chance on that page. I look at the photo, certify you from what I see, and hope to see variations.
The last lesson of the Maine course is one photograph. You carve your panel, take a picture of it, and upload that picture right here. Based on what I see, I certify you, and I hope there are some variations in it, some ideas of your own.
Have you carved your way through eighteen classes of petals, stems and dark spots? Do you want me to look at what you made? Then this lesson is for you, and it is the shortest one in the whole course.
What the Grinling Gibbons final assessment asks from you
- One photo of the finished panel, and no zip files.
- Shrink it with TinyPNG before you upload it, because the website does not like big files.
- One chance on the page.
- Some variations, your own ideas on the same design.
- A break or two is okay.
- Lacquer, shellac or liquid wax at the end, if you want a finish at all.
What does the finished panel look like?
Done, as far as I am concerned. It was almost done when class 18 started, and I promised in class 17 to show you the final, so here it is. You could work on it a little longer, of course, and take care of all those facets if you wanted to. I am going to leave it like it is.
It can always go to the extreme, with more work and more improvements. Overall, I think it looks really good. In the video I turn it and show it from different angles, and you can see how nicely it blends now.
The carving sits on a dark walnut board. I decided on walnut for the background in class 17, just for contrast, and it exaggerates all of those excavated areas. Gibbons would use English brown oak behind his work.
What happened to the small flowers from class 18?
Last time you saw me working on those little ones in class 18, and I showed you the approach. From that point you should be able to create your own, so I don't have to give you instructions for every little small flower. This is how they look.
I talked about filler flowers at the start of class 17. Pieces done by Gibbons show he used them everywhere, especially on the first layer, and you can check that yourself. On my piece I used the idea of the filler flowers, but it is a little different idea. I elaborated, and I think it looks a little better.
What do I hope to see in your photograph?
Your finished carving, with a few ideas of your own in it. When you submit your work for the assignment, I would like to see some variations. Just try to come up with some different ideas, because that way it is going to be more interesting.
I said the same thing about flowers on the floral panel. Sometimes it is a good idea to use different flowers, a different style of flowers. People who carved flowers like Gibbons used those different flowers just to make it more interesting.
We changed a couple of things on this panel ourselves. Where the wood ran out under a flower in class 12, I carved a slightly different bloom. I exposed a hidden petal in class 16 that the photograph of the original does not have. One flower became a Venetian style flower in class 17. By class 15 I was calling it semi original, because we had made it wider and made some changes. Still, about 80% of it stays true to the original Gibbons work. Whether you may change the original at all, and how much, is the question of class 1.
How do you get the photo ready?
Shrink it first. Run it through TinyPNG or something like it to make the file smaller. I have so many people, thousands of people, sending big files, and the database keeps growing, which is not too good for the website.
Use a jpg or a png, never a zip. Make sure your photo is ready before you upload, because you get one chance while you are on the page. The upload button disappears after you leave.
Who looks at your photograph?
I do. Each photo gets my own look, and the certificate comes from what is in it.
Let me know in the comments if I may post your work. I'm really proud when people who take my classes pull off stuff like that.
What should you check before you press upload?
| Check | Why |
|---|---|
| File type | Jpg or png only, and never a zip file |
| File size | Shrunk first to keep big files off the site |
| Timing | Have the photo ready before you start, with one try only |
| Changes of your own | Variations make it more interesting |
| Permission | Say in the comments whether I may post it |
What if a petal breaks?
Most likely you are going to break it in a couple of spots, and it's okay. I broke some too, and I am all right with that.
One spot in class 10 was already paper thin, and I could not do more than what I had done. It's not like the end of the world, I said. I think it's a beautiful thing about carving. If you break something, you always have an excuse to change the design.
Later in that class I felt I was pushing too much, so I stopped. I could put some glue right underneath. I could also do what Gibbons sometimes did. He would stick some kind of movement right underneath, there in the opening, and support it with another piece. A bit later I put a small amount of glue right under it.
Then in class 14 I drove my tool in upside down and broke a little piece off. I did not glue that one. I'll just live with that, I told you, and be creative with it.
Which finish can go on a carving like this?
Lacquer or shellac, or maybe even wax, but it has to be liquid wax. This is how mine looks as of now.
Gibbons himself never stained his work, as I told you in the Roman acanthus course. He never waxed it either. He left the wood natural and white, with no finish whatsoever on it.
I'm not the biggest fan of sanding. My own work I like to leave with the facets, although a lot of furniture makers like everything really smooth, and that is absolutely fine. That is what I told you on the floral panel, too.
Did Gibbons sand his carvings?
Yes, with reeds. His surface looks really smooth, and people thought he never used any sanding at all, until the restoration work. David Esterly was one of the people who restored his carvings, and up close you can see the sanding marks. I talk about that in the modern acanthus course.
Sandpaper did not exist yet. What they used was Dutch rush, the reeds that grow by the water, and that is equal to about 400 grit. I showed it online on a furniture panel. Gibbons is one of my favorite wood carvers in history, and he would use that Dutch reed rush. The whole method is in the Greek acanthus course.
Why is the Gibbons style so demanding?
Only a human hand can carve it, since in this style there is no CNC machine invented yet that can do this type of carving. Just a human hand, and that is the most advanced tool you have. It came up once on the Greek acroterion.
There is also no such thing as carving with the grain here. Absolutely no. You have to attack from some angles, and the only solution is to keep your tools sharp. Say you carve a bowl. Once you start, the grain changes direction, and there is going to be a marriage line, as we call it. If you keep carving the same way, you are going to split it, so you have to attack from both sides. That came up in a question about carving with the grain.
Making a tool list for a big project like this is almost impossible, because by the time the piece is finished, it is tremendously long. Some of the tools I use, you don't have to buy. You can get the same results with the tools you already have, as I explained in the flower rosette course.
Why study Gibbons at all?
Only two carvers in history made their names as wood carvers and became famous, and he is one of them. The other one came before him, a German carver in the 15th century, before the Reformation, as I said in the design course.
Gibbons got the royal title because of wood carving, and he was paid well, well enough to support a big shop with lots of guys working for him. That story came up while I carved the tray of blessing.
What did Gibbons carve?
Work at the artistic level, the fourth level of wood carvers. People like him would develop beautiful designs for overmantels and around picture frames. Someone else carved the frame for the art, and he created something surrounding that existing frame. I went through those levels in the Venice Room.
Ornamental carving like his is actually the most difficult kind. You work with the tiniest details, and believe me, those small details make the biggest difference, as I told the students of the Roman acanthus.
He drew right on the board, the same way we did on the Byzantine acanthus. He used screws to fix his carvings, too, and he had no problem with that. His later works are more complicated than the early ones, because he kept collecting tools, and you can see the progression in what he could execute once he got them. I mentioned the screws in the Hashemi flowers course and his tools in the Roman acanthus lessons.
Look at his bows, too. When he used a movement like a bow, he created perpendicular cuts on it, and I did the same on the chamomile and bow rosette.
Is there a story behind the pea pods?
Yes, and it is about money. I told it on the same tray of blessing. Look at his work and you will see pea pods. The story goes that a closed pod meant he had not been paid yet. Once the money came, he went back and carved the pod open with the peas inside, and that way he could keep track, since he usually worked on multiple pieces for one room.
Which books about Gibbons are worth reading?
The old ones, and the books by the man who restored his work. He wrote a couple about Gibbons, and I really like what he wrote. In the antique style rosette workshop I said a couple of old books about Gibbons were printed back in the 1950s and 1960s, and they are really good. Go on Amazon, enter Grinling Gibbons as a search word, and it will give you some results.
Is this course for everyone?
A little more advanced, and not for everyone. I do realize that. Still, I said in class 17 that you are welcome even if you never carved. Some of the people who took that class in person pretty much never carved, and they also pulled really good results.
The class in Maine had only five days. It was really four and a half days of carving, I told you in class 9, even less, because sharpening and explanations take time too. When we teach in person, sometimes the first layer is not done, and we have to glue the second layer on top. At home, I would highly recommend finishing the first layer first. I mean completely.
I hope you liked this course, and I hope you enjoyed working on it. I really hope you had fun. Let me know if you would like more courses like this one. Every lesson of it comes with tuition.
How did the eighteen classes build this panel?
His design gets sorted in class 1 into an upper layer and a lower one, with a separate board for the background. Small flowers between 16 and 25 mm, five eighths to one inch, fill the empty ground in class 2, and I want their count on a Fibonacci number. Class 3 keeps the blooms connected, with no deep valley between them. One number 7, used only on its corner, rounds the whole cluster. Every leaf in class 4 gets its anatomy, three main lines and then three more inside each.
The glue spot on the back that never gets carved is class 6. Class 7 brings in the tulip, the highest point on the board, which I read as a carver born in Holland showing off where he came from. The five parts of a flower's middle overlap in the same direction in class 8. One flower gets carved deeper in class 9 so the two glued layers blend, and class 10 is about the lime Gibbons carved.
A back bent turned upside down opens the tulip in class 11, and when a back bent goes the wrong way of the fibers, it has to be really sharp. The tiny tools come out in class 13, after the rough shape is found, and class 14 shows why parsley is not acanthus. The dark spots that make a panel look complex are class 16.
Then class 17 carves the swirling center, and class 18 the small flowers with an eye-shaped opening. This lesson is where all of it comes together, on one board.
Where can you go after this course?
More carved flowers are in the Hashemi flowers course, and the Venetian flowers rosette has the style I used for one flower here. The reasons behind a design of this kind are in the design course. Sharpening keeps the tiny tools sharp, and the tools course helps you choose what to own. All of it starts from the course page.
Thank you very much.
How it's done
- Finish the carving. Take it as far as you want. You can leave the facets, the way I left mine.
- Change a few things. Come up with some different ideas, so I see some variations in your panel.
- Photograph it. Take a picture of your carving work.
- Shrink the file. Use TinyPNG or a similar tool on the picture.
- Check the format. Save it as a jpg or a png, not inside a zip.
- Upload once. Get the photo ready first. The page gives you one try, and the button goes away once you leave.
- Say if it may be shared. Leave a comment telling me whether your carving can be posted.
Frequently asked questions
How do you get the certificate for this Gibbons course?
Upload one photograph of your finished carving on the final lesson page, and I look at every picture myself. I certify you from what the photo shows. And I would like to see a few variations of your own in it, because that way it is more interesting.
Why shrink the photo before uploading it?
Thousands of people send me pictures, and big files keep the database growing, which is not too good for the website. So shrink it first with TinyPNG or a tool like it, to make the size of the picture less.
What finish goes on a carving like this?
Lacquer or shellac works, or maybe wax, as long as it is liquid wax. I said so on camera. Gibbons himself left his wood natural and white, and he never stained or waxed it. I covered that while carving the Roman acanthus.
What to carve next