"The Picnic Tree" an Oak Tree Wood Carving in Maple Burl by Gary "Wiz" Burns the treewiz

I named “The Picnic Tree”. It is a wall hanging depicting a steady old Oak Tree passing it’s time in the woods. The kind of tree I would want to have a wonderful picnic under. With my best friends. Just relaxing and joking and having a great time. There is a lot of detail in this carving. it is one of my favorite Oak Tree carvings. It measures 21” tall x 16” wide x 2” thick. This piece is as thick as I can carve using my technique. It has a lot of depth. These Oak Tree carvings are my favorite pieces.

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https://www.etsy.com/shop/TreeWizWoodCarvings?section_id=6599799

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The technique I use is called Pierced Relief. It is carved out of one piece of wood and nothing is added. I have been carving since 1971 and a tree was the first carving I did. I have always been stimulated to carve a resemblance of a tree out of a tree. My technique has evolved over all of these years to what you see here. I keep seeing ways to make things more life like. And I love a piece to look like it is in the middle of a story that each observer can make up. Sometimes a different story each time we look at it and sometimes the same one. I love giving a piece the feeling of action. Sometimes tranquil and sometimes playful. I love it all.

I carved it out of a Big Leaf Maple Burl. The grain is really something to look at! A burl is usually caused by a trees reaction to an agro bacteria. It starts sending out a huge number of buds showing birds eye grain through out the burl. It is very unusual and is very interesting to look at. It is sort of like a wart on a person. It doesn’t seem to affect the tree much at all. Big Leaf Maples can burl in the root and all up the tree, even out on the small branches some times. Other trees might only burl in the root and others only above ground. I feel so fortunate to have these trees growing in my area!

-- Gary "Wiz" Burns, Oregon, http://www.treewiz.etsy.com