Two circumstances led me to begin creating wall hangings. The first is that I collected interesting and aesthetically attractive pieces of wood that I could not use for making stand-alone carvings. They were too nice to throw away but did not have enough solid wood to carve. The second circumstance is that the pandemic paused live art and craft shows. I needed an outlet to sell my carvings.

I explored the possibility of representation in art galleries. But I was discouraged by the high commissions demanded by commercial galleries and by the commitment of time required by artists’ cooperative galleries.

Fortunately, I discovered a gallery in a professional building run by our local hospital. It holds several shows each year and artists can submit two pieces of artwork to each show. However, the shows are hung in a hallway and there is no room for stand-alone carvings on pedestals in the hallway. So, in addition to the paintings, drawings, and photographs, it accepted my newly devised wall hangings.

For the wall hangings, I use attractive pieces of wood, such as roots, slices, and old fence posts, as backing for my carvings of birds—birds that climb around on tree trunks. That includes woodpeckers and nuthatches.

Woodpeckers always face up, even when they are going down. They hitch their way down using their tails for support. On the other hand, nuthatches are more useful and flexible to me because they walk any-which-way up and down trees. Therefore, I can position them facing different directions as is convenient on irregular pieces of wood.

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My Gallery of Wall Hangings

Click on any of the images below to open up larger pictures, and so you can swipe through the entire gallery of wall hangings.

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“For the wall hangings, I use attractive pieces of wood, such as roots, slices, and old fence posts, as backing for my carvings of birds—birds that climb around on tree trunks.”

Gary P. Carver, Ph.D. | Founder & Creator of CarversCarvings

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