Successfully Entering the SAWS Exhibition
The mandate of the SAWS Standards Committee is to ensure that all work exhibited to the public under SAWS’ name be of the highest possible quality in craftsmanship. This means that every piece that is included in the biennial SAWS Exhibition is inspected very closely by the four Standards Committee members. Based on what we see in each entry, we either accept it fully, accept it conditionally (with any issues noted to be rectified), or we reject it and provide a list of reasons for not meeting Standards Committee expectations. An external independent Jury is tasked with judging the entries from an overall design perspective.
What does the Standards Committee look for? The “Call for Entry” document lists over a dozen specific items we check for during the evaluation process (see pages 6 – 7). Please read them carefully to prevent any disappointments with your entries.
In February 2019, Standards did a full PowerPoint presentation to the SAWS membership explaining all of these items. You can read the report about it in the March, 2019 SAWS newsletter. Rather than repeat all that the above covered, I’d like to talk about some of the most common and easily avoidable issues that we ran into when going over the pieces which were submitted for the 2019 exhibition. The pictures included below were taken during that evaluation session.
The first issue has to do with sanding. There were many pieces that we accepted only conditionally – the condition being that some areas of the piece have the sanding scratches removed.
These were obvious, especially on some of the turnings. When held to a raking light, scratches stood out like a sore thumb. Getting rid of them involves some elbow grease and working through sequentially finer and finer sandpaper grits. Jumping ahead to too fine a grit (too soon) only prolongs the agony.
The following piece had sanding scratches; as seen in the first photo, as well as a poorly-glued break, a rather irregular wall thickness and shaping that had lost its crispness of edges (as seen in the second photo). In spite of its interesting shape, it was deemed to have too many issues to resolve and was consequently excluded from the exhibition.
Closely related to sanding scratches is the problem of tear-out. This often shows itself after the first coat of finish is applied and few of us are eager to go back to sanding or scraping at this point. Nevertheless, it must be done. A well sharpened scraper can make quick work of cleaning up tear-out, although it’s important to feather out this work so there are no apparent dips. Following up with sandpaper will solve the problem. A curved scraper is handy for the inside of a turned bowl.
Another area that caused a number of conditional acceptances was the finish. Applying a finish in a room filled with dust is a recipe for disaster, as shown here to the left. The only solution is to sand it down again and refinish in a dust free area.
An inadequate finish will create an uneven sheen on the work as seen left. The solution is simply to add another coat or two
Spraying can sometimes leave a “shadow” area that gets missed due to an overhang such as the drawer pull. The drawer front (right) was one of 11 that all showed the same dry area below the pull. Respraying while paying attention to this area made this piece acceptable.
Another problem seen on several pieces was too much finish, at least in some spots. Applying a finish too thickly can result in runs and sags. These need to be sanded flat. It sometimes helps to use a very sharp chisel to pare the offending bumps off, allowing the often soft finish underneath to harden, then using very fine sandpaper to even things out before applying another thin coat.
As can be seen in this second photo, applying a finish while the wood is spinning can easily lead to unsightly runs radiating out from the centre. If you catch this before you remove it from the lathe, they can easily be sanded out while the lathe is running. Again, work through your full range of grits and then refinish, this time being less generous. If you wait until the Standards Committee points it out, it likely will require much more hand sanding to get it right.
Applying a finish takes care. Brush marks do not enhance fine woodwork. When they do show up, they need to be sanded out before resubmitting.
Another issue that often shows itself after the first coat of finish is applied is excess glue that wasn’t cleaned up. Often appearing near joints, but sometimes showing up elsewhere, these light spots require sanding or scraping off the finish and glue, to expose bare wood, then refinishing. It’s important to keep glue off your fingers when gluing up your piece. It’s easy to leave a fingerprint that only shows up after the finishing stage.
These observations are not intended to run down the craftsmen that submit these pieces, but to provide constructive criticism from which the maker can learn. I’ve been careful not to mention whose pieces these were – that’s not important. It’s not about SAWS being an elitist group, but rather to encourage makers and to showcase fine workmanship to the public, portraying the woodworking craft’s creative capability.
The fewer pieces we need to reject, the happier we will be. We hope to see lots of great pieces submitted in June.
Submitted by Herm Stolte, Chair, Standards Committee with thanks to fellow members Fred Coates, Bill Maniotakis, and Dave Ross for their editing and input.