Small School

Whittling: The Poetics of Engagement
A Wood Carving Workshop with Visiting Artist Karl Burkheimer
9-12, Saturday August 16 at Birdland

This hands-on, three-hour workshop invites participants to explore the practice of thinking through doing. We’ll begin with a short reading and group discussion to frame the session, followed by instruction and a focused investigation of woodcarving.

Using whittling as both technique and metaphor, the workshop emphasizes attentiveness to material, the beauty of the ordinary, and the steady unfolding of skill. Participants will learn tool use, carving methods, safety protocols, and foundational approaches to creative practice and compositional problem-solving.

Ultimately, the act of making becomes a practice of presence—an invitation to engage more deeply with process, place, and possibility.

All materials and tools provided. Participants will leave with a Japanese Kiridashi Knife, thumb guard and their carved piece.

Register in bio (please email [email protected] if you are left handed, so we can provide the appropriate knife).

Karl Burkheimer is a practicing artist residing in Portland, Oregon. His artistic practice is founded on labor, skill and the built environment, reflecting varied experiences as a carpenter, artist, and educator. His work has been exhibited nationally, including solo exhibitions in Seattle, Brooklyn, Los Angeles, and Portland, Oregon. His critical writing has been published in Ceramic Monthly, and he has received several awards of recognition as well as institutional funding, including project grants from the Oregon Arts Commission, a 2012 individual Artist Fellowship from OAC, 2013 Contemporary Northwest Art Awards at the Portland Art Museum, a 2013 U.S.-Japan Creative Artist Fellowship, a Hallie Ford Fellowship in 2016, and a MacDowell Fellowship in 2021.