"Fractures Embrace" Bladeshow 2021 Dagger

Travis Fry said:
Paul, I'm very curious what those specific goals are.

There are a lot of extremely talented artisans making beautiful knives that some would consider art, but are really just very well crafted tools. There are a lot of other folks that make "art" knives that are really just highly embellished pieces. There are very few that actually see conceive of their knives as art objects with meaning and intention beyond function or embellishment. There are far, far fewer who do this well. Fewer than I have fingers and toes, I'd guess. You're setting yourself up to be one of the greats, and I hope you continue to push and evolve.

I'm starting to try to bend my mind that way as well--to be a legit artist instead of just a good knifemaker. And, frankly, seeing your knives at Blade this last year was a significant part of the push I needed to break away from "mere" craftsmanship. Let's hear those goals. I'm also interested to hear if you have a long term arc of focus to keep your works as part of a coherent oeuvre, or if you're just planning to wing it and leave the interpretation of coherence to the folks who write about you after you're dead.
Click to expand...
hey Travis, I hesitate to tell people my goals sometimes because I don’t want them to come across in a negative way. There might not be anything bad about them but I’m always afraid someone might view that as arrogance. It’s really more of staying positive and willing things into existence.
Before I first started making knives my first goal was to become a master smith as fast as I could. Then with that out of the way I could really be more expressive and out of the box with my builds.
when I first went to a knife show I walked around a bit and came to the same conclusions you mentioned above. There’s a lot of high level craftsmen but not necessarily artists. And a lot of the pieces that many consider art knives are just an ordinary knife design with high end embellishments. I don’t view many art knives as true art knives. Don’t get me wrong many are absolutely amazing. Try thinking of it this way, if you take an amazing painting that’s a work of art and have it put on mini van. Is that mini van an art van now? At least in my eyes having a knife maker make a nice folder that’s somewhat ordinary and sending it out to get high end engraving on it doesn’t make it an art “knife”

so I’d like my work to check every box. I want to create the most beautiful and elegant knives ever created. I want to be innovative and create my own new damascus. I want to create new profiles and blade/handle/guard styles that are the pinnacle of elegance. I want to do amazing carvings and engravings that can tell a story or evoke feelings and emotions without needing an explanation behind the piece and it’s meaning.

A goal is to also be a member of the most exclusive art knife shows in the world.

1)most of all I want to be the best to have ever done it.
2)Taking inspiration from David goggins, the goal is to be uncommon in a room full of uncommon people.
when I do something I try to put all o my
Effort into it and i truly believe that everyone should have these two ideas in their head every time they put effort into something they care about. If your making kitchen knives or camp knives or anything, the same thoughts apply just as well.

I am an artist first. If I wasn’t making knives I’d for sure be painting or drawing or making sculptures. Knives are just a super cool and fun thing to make so why not try to incorporate the two right.
I try to incorporate other forms of art into my work to make it more interesting. Things like pottery techniques, ancient jewelers techniques I have a few painting techniques I’m trying to adopt and use on my knives. I think adding different techniques used in other art mediums can help push the norms of what is considered an art knife nowadays
Thinking of my work as sculptures helps me break out of the common rules or guidelines most follow for what a knife should be and look like. I feel if I think of it as a sculpture it opens it up to an infinite amount of new designs and ideas. I’ve always said I want my work to be displayed in peoples homes like paintings or sculptures. So I just have to figure out a way to create a knife that’s also a sculpture and work of art and not just a nice knife with embellishments.


but ya those are a few thoughts I have in my head. Will I ever accomplish them, no idea. Do they make sense to other people and not just me? No idea. Hahahhahaha. But at any rate I haven’t figured out anything yet. Don’t even know what my style is yet. It’s all still a work in progress.
It’s super cool that You said I was a part of the push for you Travis to break away from past “mere craftsmanship” we can be on this journey together. If you figure it out before I do I’m gonna need some tips hahah
 
I want to create the most beautiful and elegant knives ever created. I want to be innovative and create my own new damascus. I want to create new profiles and blade/handle/guard styles that are the pinnacle of elegance. I want to do amazing carvings and engravings that can tell a story or evoke feelings and emotions without needing an explanation behind the piece and it’s meaning.

A goal is to also be a member of the most exclusive art knife shows in the world.

1)most of all I want to be the best to have ever done it.
2)Taking inspiration from David goggins, the goal is to be uncommon in a room full of uncommon people.
when I do something I try to put all o my
Effort into it and i truly believe that everyone should have these two ideas in their head every time they put effort into something they care about. If your making kitchen knives or camp knives or anything, the same thoughts apply just as well.

I am an artist first. If I wasn’t making knives I’d for sure be painting or drawing or making sculptures. Knives are just a super cool and fun thing to make so why not try to incorporate the two right.
I try to incorporate other forms of art into my work to make it more interesting. Things like pottery techniques, ancient jewelers techniques I have a few painting techniques I’m trying to adopt and use on my knives. I think adding different techniques used in other art mediums can help push the norms of what is considered an art knife nowadays
Thinking of my work as sculptures helps me break out of the common rules or guidelines most follow for what a knife should be and look like. I feel if I think of it as a sculpture it opens it up to an infinite amount of new designs and ideas. I’ve always said I want my work to be displayed in peoples homes like paintings or sculptures. So I just have to figure out a way to create a knife that’s also a sculpture and work of art and not just a nice knife with embellishments.
Click to expand...

Paul, I don't think anyone whose opinion you care about will think of anything you said as coming from a place of arrogance. Several of the things you just said really resonate with and echo my own personal goals and things I've been thinking about:

- To make knives which, through whatever means, evoke feelings/emotions or tell a story or create meaning without needing an explanation. The danger here for me is to be too literal. It takes an explicit effort to avoid this.
- Thinking of knives as sculpture. I like this idea, and it both keeps things in perspective and creates new persepectives. Thanks!
- I'm challenging myself to make a knife using each of the techniques I'm studying as part of the jewelry classes I'm taking (as well as spin-off techniques I chase down and learn after brushing against them in class). It causes interesting problems (how does one incorporate making chains into a knife, for example?). To me, every new technique acquired is another tool that reduces my limits.
- Why settle for "doing your best" when trying to be the best there is will push you so much farther? Keep at this, and those exclusive knife shows will happen. At least half of the folks already invited to those shows aren't even doing the kinds of things we're talking about, though they're doing their thing very well.

Thanks for posting.
 
hey Paul, are you familiar with the work of Gay Rocha?
 
Lorien said:
hey Paul, are you familiar with the work of Gay Rocha?
Click to expand...
No I’ve actually never heard of him. I tried looking him up but could not really find anything on him or about him. Even images of his knives I couldn’t really find. Only 2 small ones
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top