Christine Meyer-Eaglestone
Wood marquetry maker
Leeds, United Kingdom
Geometrics in a material of choice
- Christine creates artworks and functional pieces with a marquetry surface
- She has made nearly 500 pieces since her Crafts Council Setting Up Grant in 2001
- Her compositions are designed and built intuitively
Originally from Germany, Christine Meyer-Eaglestone has worked and lived in the UK since 1970. She studied fine art at graduate level, later building on this with an MA in sculpture. It was not until 1996, when Christine enrolled on a cabinetmaking course out of a passion for furniture and architectural design, that she picked up a wood veneer for the first time and something clicked. "I swapped my painter's materials for wood veneers," she says. After 13 years of teaching art following her fine art degree, including at a top-security prison in Wakefield, Christine decided to dedicate all her time to making. She cuts geometric shapes by hand, inserting them into a veneer background, working from the inside out to let colour and composition evolve, without a working drawing. "I consider it painting in wood," she says. "I still get excited by every new veneer I see."
INTERVIEW
Balance and rhythm are essential to my designs. Right angles create calm and diagonals create tension. The longer I work on a piece, the riskier it gets: one wrong cut and I could ruin everything I have done beforehand. When I finally take it off the cutting-mat and turn it over, it is always a surprise to see the design without the veneer tape holding it together.
The material speaks to me. Architectural inspiration and music can be triggers. I work without preparatory sketches. When making a mirror, I decide on the area the glass will occupy and begin by working on one frame. I will spend as much time deliberating as cutting.
I love my Japanese snap-off knife. My floor gets littered with blade sections as I must replenish constantly. I score a veneer multiple times before going through and cutting the material, otherwise the blade follows the grain of the wood. This sort of tip is something you only learn by doing.
I found my material in my forties. I had been cutting fabric up from childhood, and recycled card during my MA to create sculptural objects. So picking up a veneer was not entirely new. Keep reinventing yourself. Who is there to stop you? Nobody, really.
Christine Meyer-Eaglestone
Wood marquetry maker
Leeds, United Kingdom
ADDRESS
Address upon request, Leeds, United Kingdom
AVAILABILITY
By appointment only
PHONE
+44 7791890731
LANGUAGES
English, German
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