NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 1983, No. 43, $3.50 Making ... - Wood Tools

Goats Get Jitn Pritchard
How a homebuilder became a figure carver
by Deborah Navas
" 'm used to seeing four walls, rafters
I and a joist system go up in the
two weeks it takes me to carve one of
these things," Jim Pritchard says, referring
to the 4-ft. high carved wooden
figures that took over his life two years
ago. "It's just the opposite of carpentry.
It's indefmite. When I start a figure, I
never know if I'm going to pull it off
or not."
Pritchard, in partnership with his
wife, Laurel, has spent most of the last
20 years designing and building colonial-sryle
homes in the Dublin, N.H.,
area. The only woodcarving he did was
strictly as a hobby, or occasionally to
decorate furniture or architectural details.
His venture into carving was pure
happenstance. He had always been interested
in .old wooden advertising figures
Cbut too cheap to buy one," Laurel
comments), and when he came
across some pictures of figureheads,
wooden Indians and other folk art at a
local flea market, he thought, why not
try making one for himself? He went
home and carved a 3-ft. high Indian
maiden. When he brought it along with
him to the next flea market,
much to his amazement it
Detail of Jim Pritchard's
'Renaissance Satyr. ' Full
view, facing page.
sold on the sPOt. Though he didn't
know it at the time, he had just begun a
career change from house builder to figure
carver.
His early figures were mostly subjects
from traditional folk art: Indians, a
clown, a baseball player. Then, in a
carving meant to be something else altogether,
a leering goat-like countenance
emerged. The saryrs evolved between
trips to see the goats at the local Friendly
Farm and forays through a shelf
of European art books. Blending the
earthy and the fantastic, Pritchard's
goats would be dressed in period costume,
and made to resemble the kings
of Europe.
Though he carves both human and
saryric figures, the goats (as he calls
them) are Pritchard's favorites. They
give him more artistic license than the
human figures and they're faster to do.
"With a strictly anatomical woodcarving,"
he says, "I have to be too careful
not to blow it. I've spent up to twelve
hours on a single arm. But with a goat, I
can usually incorporate a mistake into
the design-who's to say saryrs don't
look like that?"
Because Pritchard first started selling
his figures at a flea market, portabiliry
determined their size. "People buy them
on impulse," he says. "If they have to
wait a few days to borrow Uncle Harry's
truck, they go home and think, 'Do we
really need a satyr for our living
room?' " Besides, the dwarfish size of
the figures is appropriate for creatures
of the imagination. A larger saryr would
be intimidating, while a smaller figure
would lack the uncanny presence.
The closest Pritchard came to any
formal art training was a minor in art
history at Keene State College; his carving
techniques have evolved through
experience and his knowledge of carpentry.
A local sawmill saves him their
clearest kiln-dried 2x 12 Eastern white
pine boards. He prefers pine because it
allows him to work quickly-"these
things aren't finely detailed, I'm not
tempted to put in eyelashes." He lami-
Photos: ., 1983 Frank Cordelle