The Gentle Art of Scrimshaw!

Greetings, FinderMakers! If you have followed me from the get-go, you may remember some earlier posts that reflected my interest in mammoth ivory and old piano key ivory and their use in scrimshaw. I am pleased to finally offer this third and final installation in my "Urban Scrimshaw" series: An easy-to-use tutorial that will have you scrimming like a salty old sea dog in no time! The image above is a scrimshawed whale tooth from the Nicholson Whaling Collection at the Providence Public Library, an excellent resource for inspirational images and information! The image below shows some old ivory piano keys I pulled from an abandoned piano.



Before we begin, I have two requests of you, kind reader: First, please do go back and read my earlier posts on mammoth ivory and piano key ivory, as the latter is the material of focus in this tutorial, and that earlier post will provide you with a solid pedestal of knowledge upon which your crafty new skills may be proudly installed. Second, please know that I myself am no "salty old sea dog" in the scrimshaw department; My scrimshaw schooner has only just sailed out of the port and I have plenty to learn as this journey unfolds! My own drawing skills are sorely lacking, and so I have adapted a solvent-transfer technique to the art of scrimshaw to aid in the process of creating a clear, recognizable image, so even if you can barely draw a smiley face, you'll still have a pretty good shot at making a beautiful piece of scrimshaw if you follow along with me!



Above are some of the items used for this project:
- an old ivory piano key (or other suitable material, like a piece of mammoth ivory)
- a pin secured in an x-acto knife holder
- some black ink
- acetone (nail polish remover)
- a little block of beeswax
You will also need a regular black and white photocopy of the image you want to etch onto your ivory.

To begin, I shall explain that the basic procedure for producing scrimshaw simply involves scratching an image into the surface of the ivory with a pin, then applying ink (or, in the olden days, "lamp black," soot collected from oil lamps), which soaks into the scratches and is wiped away from the unscratched surface. The first step in our process will be to seal the surface of our piano key, as it is somewhat porous and, if left unsealed, may soak up some of the black ink that we apply after the design has been scratched in, leaving an unwanted inky black cloud on the key that will be impossible to remove.



To seal the key, I place a buffing wheel on my dremel tool and start it spinning. Then I touch the spinning wheel to my little block of beeswax so that the wheel picks up a little wax. The wheel, now loaded with wax, is run all over the surface of the piano key so that the wax gets worked into it. Afterwards, you will see the hazy layer of beeswax on the surface of the key; just rub it with a clean cloth until the excess surface wax has been buffed off and the key looks nice and shiny. If you don't have a dremel tool, that's ok; just rub a little block of beeswax thoroughly over the surface of the key, making sure not to miss any spots. When you have built up a thin layer, buff the key with a clean cloth until it looks shiny... it is now all sealed and ready for the next step!

Now you will need to decide what image you would like to scratch into the surface of your key. I found one of those clip art books full of Victorian-era illustrations at the thrift store; it is a great source for appropriate images! When you find something you like, scale it down to fit on the piano key either on your computer (photoshop, etc.), or directly on a black and white photocopy machine. The solvent-transfer technique only works with standard black and white photocopies, so if you scale your images on the computer, you will need to print them out and then bring your printout to the copy shop and make a black and white photocopy of it. If you are using an image that involves text, the transfer technique applies a reversed image onto the surface of the piano key, so you will need to print out your image in reverse if you want it to show up correctly after it is transferred. Below is a section of my photocopy sheet with some appropriately scaled images; I chose to use a horse head with some leafy swags.



Next, trim your image out and decide where on the piano key you would like it to go:



Place the image face down on the surface of the piano key and moisten a cotton ball with nail polish remover. Holding the slip of paper firmly in place with one hand, dab the soaked cotton ball onto the back of the paper with your other hand. The acetone will free the photocopy ink from the paper surface, transferring it onto the ivory! Make sure the paper gets plenty damp with acetone (it will become translucent) and then, after a few seconds (but before the paper begins to dry) peel the paper away from the key-- your image will be transferred!





If it doesn't work perfectly, don't fret. Just wipe the image off of the piano key with your acetone-soaked cotton ball, reseal the surface with beeswax, and try again with a new photocopy image (you can't use them twice, so it's a good idea to print out several copies of the images you want to use!)



Now that we have a nice template transferred onto the piano key, we can start our scrimshaw! The dark parts of the transfer will be the dark parts of the competed scrimshaw and, as you will recall, the black ink soaks into the lines we have scratched into the ivory surface, so we can now start to scratch lines into the dark areas of the transfer. This is best accomplished with the tip of a pin or sewing needle that has been tightly screwed into an x-acto knife holder. I use wire cutters to nip about a 1/2 inch of the sharp tip off of a sewing needle, then place this in the x-acto holder with about 1/4 inch protruding, then screw the holder down so the needle tip can't move.



You will probably need to experiment with what type of lines end up looking the most appealing to you: shading can be accomplished by scratching in "crosshatched" lines, or by varying the distance between the lines that you scratch into the ivory surface. You might also like to try a fatter sewing needle versus a thinner one to vary the size of the lines. Sometimes a "stippling" technique is used: The needle tip is pushed into the ivory creating fields of tiny dots that comprise darker or lighter shaded areas depending on the number of dots applied. Detailed stippling can yield images that look nearly photographic! In the photo below, you can see that I have scratched away almost all of the black photocopy transfer image; it is now time to apply the black ink!





The ink is applied with a cotton swab that I dipped into the ink. Let the ink dry (only takes a minute) then wipe the dried ink off the ivory surface with a slightly damp paper towel; the dried ink will stay in the lines you scratched, and your image is now revealed! Now wet a piece of paper towel with a little acetone, and rub the surface lightly to remove any leftover bits of the photocopy ink.



Now go ahead and seal the surface with beeswax again just like you did in the beginning; this will seal in the ink so it wont bleed if you should get the ivory wet again. If you see some areas that need to be scratched more, then you can do so now, after you have sealed it the second time. Just add in some more scratches and repeat the inking and sealing process. You can keep doing this until you are pleased with the way your image looks!



If you don't have access to a black and white photocopier, you may achieve similar results in the following manner: Scale down your image to the appropriate size on the computer and print it out. Then draw over the dark areas in your image with a sharp pencil (I use a mechanical pencil). Next, place the image face down on your piano key and rub the back of the image with a spoon, bone folder, or similar hard, blunt object; this will transfer the pencil outline faintly onto the surface of your ivory! The picture below is a piano key with a scrimshawed sperm whale I did using the pencil transfer technique... it turned out nicely!



And a few more:





I based the Kachina drawing above on this actual Hopi carved cottonwood root Kachina, called "Ahote":



Thanks so much for joining me, and please do feel free to contact me if you need any clarification or additional info!



(please note: scrimshaw imagery and art, piano key scrimshaw, etc. property the artist, copyright Paul Baxendale 2009/2010)

Back From The Land of Enchantment

Greetings, readers! I'm just back from a most enchanting stay in the Land of Enchantment... New Mexico! It was a wonderful week, full of adventure and exploration, and although I'm on a strict budget, I brought back some neat items, costing little or nothing, that I had been hoping to find.

Although much of the land there is quite arid, wherever there is water, there will be giant, majestic Cottonwood trees. They are called "Paako" (meaning "water wood") by the Hopi Indians on account of their ability to seek out and find water. The Hopi use the roots of the cottonwood tree to make "Kachinas", intricately carved and decorated representations of benevolent Hopi spirit helpers that are given to children as teaching tools. While Kachinas are still an integral part of the Hopi way of life, the beauty and artistry of the carved figures did not escape the eye of outsiders, and eventually Hopi artisans began carving Kachinas to sell in the tourist markets. Today, finely carved Kachinas worth hundreds or even thousands of dollars are sought out by avid collectors, and more simply crafted Kachinas are carried all over the world by visitors to New Mexico and Arizona eager to take with them a beautiful and meaningful reminder of the spirit of the southwest.

Having grown up largely in Arizona and New Mexico, I've been familiar with Kachinas for years, but rather than buying one from a curio shop, I thought it might be a fun and informative experience to try to carve my own. I am grateful to my brother-in-law for conveying his knowledge of the craft (which is considerable!) and to my nephew, who guided me through a grand forest of Cottonwoods towards some that had fallen, allowing access to the sacred roots from which traditional Kachinas are carved. I hope to keep readers apprised of my progress when I begin the project, but first I will do some more research and decide what figure I should like to depict! As Ive done in earlier posts, I would like to direct anyone interested in Kachinas and Hopi culture towards another website, rather than clutter up the Internet with redundant and possibly incomplete information.... the Guide to Hopi Kachina Dolls does a far better job of explaining Kachinas than I could hope to do here.

Pictured at the top of this post are two of the four Cottonwood roots I carried back to Providence with me. I was also very happy to be able to gather up a nice ball of sticky, fragrant resin from some Piñon pine trees in Taos that I will likely use as a natural adhesive or varnish in some project or other. One of my favorite ways to evoke the spirit of New Mexico here on the east coast is to light a log of Piñon wood incense from Incienso de Santa Fe. The aroma of burning Piñon and Cedar woods wafting on a crisp, cool breeze through an ancient pueblo is something anyone can experience by picking up a box of this incense!

When traveling from Santa Fe to Taos (something anyone visiting the Land of Enchantment is apt to do) a worthwhile diversion may be had by exiting the highway and making ones way along a scenic, winding road towards the small village of Chimayo. Here, nestled within a valley in the Sangre de Cristo mountain range, you will find New Mexico's most visited chapel, the Santuario de Nuestro Señor de Esquipulas, commonly called the Santuario de Chimayo. The current chapel was built in 1816 to house a miraculous crucifix that was found when a Chimayo Friar performing penances noticed a burst of light issuing forth from a nearby hillside. The friar began digging where he had seen the flash, and uncovered the crucifix which, although it was removed and taken to another chapel in the village of Santa Cruz 3 times, miraculously reappeared in the original hole in Chimayo each time. Today, thousands of people make pilgrimages to the chapel to view the crucifix and kneel and scoop dirt that is believed to have curative powers from the original hole in which that crucifix was found. I was among those thousands, and feel honored to have had the opportunity to collect and bring home a sample of this much revered dirt. Following are a few pictures from the Santuario:


Exterior of Chapel

Hole in which the miraculous crucifix was found, and from which pilgrims may take a scoop of alleged curative dirt.

Picturesque Chimayo.

Finally... worthwhile southwestern souvenirs need not be expensive; This fun image was printed on a paper bag from a gift shop. Cut out and framed, I think it would make a very fetching decorative print!