ROCHESTER'S MASTER CRAFTSMAN/ARTIST

ROCHESTER’S MASTER CRAFTSMAN/ARTIST

by Joan K. Yanni

Artist, master-craftsman, or furniture-designer? Wendell Castle is all three. One of the premier furniture makers in America, his works are in the collections of major museums, including the Smithsonian in Washington, DC, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Metropolitan Museum, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. MAG has a number of his works, the most familiar being the Dr. Caligari clock, the Suggestion Box and Lord Dragonfly Chair.

Dragonfly Chair

Suggestion Bo

Dr. Caligari Clock

Though Rochesterians think of him as one of their own, Castle was born in Emporia, Kansas, in 1932 and came to Rochester to teach at RIT’s School for American Craftsmen (today the School for American Crafts) in 1962. He has been here ever since.

He was trained as a sculptor, earning his BFA in industrial design and his MFA in sculpture from the University of Kansas. In addition to RIT, where he has been artist-in-residence since 1984, Castle has taught at University of Kansas and the State University of New York at Brockport. He ran his own woodworking school at his studio in Scottsville from 1980 to 1988. He has been designing and crafting furniture throughout his career, but his technique and materials have been constantly evolving.

Much of his work is created using the stack lamination process, a classical technique that he has refined. First, one must visualize the desired result, then cut boards to the approximate end shape and glue them together. With a chain saw, the glued piece is cut closer to the desired shape; then, finally, it is carefully carved into the finished work. Castle notes that modern glues have made possible more creative designs, since the glues expand and contract with the wood. Examples of this technique include MAG’s Suggestion Box, and the Blanket Chest. These are sinuous, organic forms and were made at a time when seeing the color and grain of the wood was particularly important. His biomorphic pieces can also be seen in the lectern and baptismal font at St. Thomas Episcopal Church on Winton Road and the Ark of the Covenant at Temple Sinai.

Castle hasn’t limited himself to working with wood. During the 50s and 60s he turned to plastics, which he hoped would be less expensive and more accessible to the public than his one-of-a-kind wood pieces. One of the forms that he produced in plastic is his functional “molar chair.”  He also made purely sculptural forms in glass-reinforced polyester, such as the 12’ high public sculpture Twist, which stands in Genesee Crossroads Park. The large red sculpture catches one’s eye as it stands out against the landscape. But since none of Castle’s work is simple, even Twist demands a second look. The piece is designed with several flat surfaces that can be used as seats for visitors who want to sit and enjoy their surroundings.

Castle did not give up wood for fiberglass. One commission finished in the 70s gave him special visibility in Rochester and elsewhere. He was commissioned by the Gannett Corporation    which was headquartered in Rochester at the time, to create furniture and a staircase for its offices. Photographs of the pieces were widely distributed and gained national attention. 

In the mid-70s Castle turned from organic forms to elegant, often humorous trompe-l’oeil works. With meticulous detail, seemingly impossible to create in wood, he produced startling works: objects such as keys, gloves, and hats resting on an elegant table; a coat hanging over a chair or a coat rack; a tablecloth draped over a table. These are some of the most sculptural of his pieces, for the chair is not for sitting but for looking--and convincing oneself that the items lying casually on the table or over the chair are not real. MAG’s Table with Tablecloth and the new Chair Standing on its Head  (Can you believe the pillow is not real?) are both trompe-l’oeil pieces.

In 1988 Castle was commissioned to build the 500,000^th Steinway piano. He decided that he could not change the shape of the Steinway Model D, the standard instrument in the concert world, so he used variations elsewhere. He used striped Indian ebony, and the names of more than 1000 artists who used Steinway pianos on their concert tours were carved into the case   He did make one change in the design.  He moved the rear leg, always found on the back of the piano, to the center of the instrument. To do this, he had to construct a bridge-like device that would keep the leg from actually touching the underside of the piano where it would interfere with the vibrations that produce sound. After its unveiling at Carnegie Hall, the piano was exhibited at the Gallery before going on a tour of world concert halls, where renowned pianists were allowed to play it.

In the 1980s Castle did a series of 13 clocks, including MAG’s Dr.Caligari. (See “About Gallery Art,” May 1996) Using the Caligari theme, taken from a 1917 movie in which the background and scenery is skewed, he also did a library, now in the MAG collection, for NYC gallery owner Peter T. Joseph.  The walls are made of satinwood, gesso, leather and acrylic. The bookshelves look as though they are about to topple, but they don’t. Castle says the slant of the shelves is better for the books; they lean against each other rather than on their covers and binding.

One cannot talk about Castle without mentioning his public sculptures. They include a 19-foot clock on the corner of Toronto’s windy, busy Yonge and Bloor Streets. This clock is made of metal with a round, antiqued bronze face and three-foot-long gold-leafed hands. It is supported by a zigzagged stainless steel arch, high enough for pedestrians to walk under. Another clock, the 19-foot bronze Lunar Eclipse, is now in the Rochester International Airport concourse. One of his more recent public pieces is his wall sculpture for the Bausch and Lomb headquarters: a 45-foot by 12-foot mural of wood, neon and acrylic called Metamorphosis.

More and more, Castle’s furniture is accepted as art by museums and collectors. As the artist points out, “When collectors buy it, it is used like a sculpture. It’s in the room to be looked at and enjoyed. It’s not put there because there was a need for a table.”

 Source: CWA Library files