Sterling Nature Center's
Art & Nature Exhibition Wall
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The Art & Nature Wall is one of the exciting new additions to the Sterling Nature Center, providing a space where local artists who are inspired by nature can showcase and sell their work. This rotating exhibit highlights art that celebrates the beauty of the natural world, featuring a variety of mediums from painting and photography to mixed media. By supporting these artists, we continue to foster a deeper connection between art and nature, inspiring creativity and appreciation for the environment.
If you're an artist interested in exhibiting your work, please contact us for more information!
Q
Q&A with Howard Bartle Woodworking with NativeWood
1. Q: What got you into woodworking, and why do you like using wood from around here?
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​ A: I grew up in a “building” family: masonry and wood, but with broad exposure to (what was then) building technology. Long story short, I built a speed boat in the basement as a teenager. Using local species is obvious to me: availability, familiarity, and as a woodsman, these trees practically beg to be used for something beyond firewood. We’re blessed with numerous incredible species near this Great Lake. My wife and I planted, decades ago, many thousands of trees, some of which provided wood for various projects.
2. Q: What kinds of wood do you usually work with from the Sterling area? Any favorites?
A: I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I like using unusual woods, everything from sumac
(super soft) to black locust (super hard) with the additional components of
crookedness, insect damage, and even decomposition. Finding unusual pieces, from
an interesting dead limb to a wayward slab coming off a crooked log at the mill,
delights me. It was once alive and growing; now, it offers utility to anyone
interested. I am interested in cottonwood: huge, fast-growing trees with
surprisingly variable color and grain, even burling in large knots.
3. Q: Do you gather the wood yourself, or do you have a go-to source?
A: My sources are several: driftwood bits, fallen trees, firewood from the local woods are all fair game. Woodmizer sawmills (portable bandsaw sawmills) are a huge
boon to builders and woodworkers alike: the mill typically comes to the farm and
we attack a pile of logs, turning them carefully to better reveal their contents with
each pass of the thin (thereby wood saving) blade.
4. Q: What do you like most about working with natural wood?
A: . Wood is a very forgiving material: one can, and often must, recalculate, alter the
design, and even repair things in progress. It’s typically a process of addition: joining elements in various ways, sometimes homogenous, often contrasting. There are numerous “Aha!” moments when finished work is oiled. Products show their history and growth through the rings of grain. It’s a warm material; it invites touching.
5. Q: Have you ever encountered an interesting or unusual piece of wood that turned into something special?
A: A piece of driftwood, a root containing a beach stone, is a special thing, begging
for a unique use and place in a larger work. The stretcher on the walnut-topped
table (in the Nature Center show) is such an object to be celebrated.
6. Q: What’s your process like? Do you have a favorite technique for bringing out the best in the wood?
A: My technique is mental and visual: hundreds of boards, peeled branches, and odd bits become my palette, potential elements in god-knows-what. For instance, hundreds of small decisions, maybe thousands, go into a table. Decades of
assembling things inform almost every micro-choice. Choosing, assessing, rechoosing, fitting, refitting, adjusting, on and on until I’m satisfied.
7. Q: How does the landscape and nature around Sterling inspire your work?
A: Sterling is home: home, especially our woods, speaks to me on a very
deep level. I don’t necessarily care if a board or branch came from our forest or
the local Lakeshore, but my concern and understanding of the materials, at best,
result in work that stands on its own and reflects nature’s beauty. For instance, the possible
utility of a table is just icing on the cake.
Artist Note's
Nature, rearranged…
Let’s say you’re beach combing on Lake Ontario or hiking/birdwatching on a Nature Center trail. Suddenly you stumble onto a mass of driftwood or perhaps a fallen tree: a particular (former?) branch strikes your fancy, its shape or texture seems extra attractive to your senses: maybe you see an abstract face or animal in the thing. You could photograph the object, or maybe fashion a walking stick for the rest of your mini adventure. Or, you might be so taken with that branch (or it could be a small stone) that you deposit it in your vehicle and take it home. Is it a souvenir, a memento of your afternoon or evening, or could it be something more?
My work is often fashioned from such things. It seeks to celebrate (possibly) random items and turn them into table legs and such, a piece of another larger piece that may serve folks daily in a utilitarian way but with a deeper context: it’s a naturally formed entity, now granted another whole life. Rather than just rotting away or being burned by sundown walkers, it becomes home decor: furniture.
Decades ago, after accumulating driftwood bits and wooden elements, I found the need to, and the creative fun of, assembling these pieces into valuable objects, bringing nature literally into my home. At their best, the objects became unique reminders of nature’s beauty and diversity. For example, most commercial table legs are straight, sawn-out lumber, but they needn’t be: a curvilinear leg, even a twisted one, offers strength and visual interest. The colors and textures, overlayed on the thing’s shape, renders a given piece potential uniqueness, a daily delight for the nature lover, perhaps stuck indoors by the weather.
I favor a “coat of many colors” approach, often using several tree species together, mixing and matching forms, colors, and surfaces. I find most work well together, usually playing off each other to good effect. I hope you enjoy all this and the design elements, along with “fit and finish” concerns that go into a given piece.
