Typically a door is only a door. However at a sure medical clinic in Wisconsin the place researchers are searching for cures for PTSD and extreme melancholy, there’s a 7-ft.-high, 12-ft.-wide sliding door between the kitchen and eating room that incorporates a marquetry mural by Spider Johnson and Cindy Goldman.
The mural was designed particularly for the area and particularly for the aim of providing solace and hope to folks recovering from deep trauma—a door out of the darkish. Johnson, who lives in Mason, Tex., first twigged to marquetry in 1979 when he noticed some work by Silas Kopf in FWW #16, and he’s been pursuing the craft ever since.
Twelve years in the past, Johnson took on as an apprentice fellow Texan Cindy Goldman. The previous promoting artistic director discovered so shortly and so nicely that in a 12 months or so, she turned his accomplice in marquetry. For a few years, Johnson reduce his marquetry with a scrollsaw, however in 2000, he purchased a laser cutter with a 4-ft.-sq. mattress, and he’s by no means seemed again.
The reducing is simpler with a laser, however on a undertaking like this, with the marquetry composition utilized throughout 4 3-ft. by 7-ft. panels that wanted to match up completely once they have been joined and put in on-site, there was a lot else for Johnson and Goldman to take care of. Veneers embody madrone burl for the bottom; walnut burl for the roots; goncolo alves for the trunk; purple gum, pau ferro, and satinwood for the leaves; dyed veneer for the wind; and composite veneer for the sky.
—Jonathan Binzen
Pictures: courtesy of Spider Johnson and Cindy Goldman
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