Many hikers say the appeal of walking through New England forests lies not just in doing something physical in a beautiful setting: They’ll tell you it’s also often about finding a spiritual connection to nature.
Elton Braithwaite knows exactly what they’re talking about.
For over 50 years, the Granby sculptor has been turning old tree trunks, roots and branches into both delicate and dramatic artwork, from walking staffs and freestanding totems to masks and relief carvings.
But that’s only possible, he says, because he respects the spirit that every tree has and factors that into his work. He works exclusively with dead wood he finds or is given; he never carves live trees.
“Trees are there for us as human beings,” he says in his lilting Jamaican accent. “They give us air and shade and food and beauty. They have blood in them, just like us.”
In fact, he calls his gallery “Species of Earth.” His work might broadly be called tribal art, with figures and images inspired by the art of indigenous cultures.
“That spirit, that energy, lives in the wood,” adds Braithwaite, 67. “And that’s the way you have to approach it — with respect, with patience, with determination. Otherwise you’re not going to be able to carve it.”
He’s got another phrase he likes to use in describing his work: “It’s about taking away the negative and leaving the positive.”
Since moving to the Valley from New Jersey in 1982 — first to Holyoke, then to Granby — Braithwaite has become a familiar figure both in artistic and educational circles in the region. From teaching wood carving in area schools to leading small-group lessons for students of all ages at his home, he has sought to share his experience and pass on the art of wood sculpting.
“It’s not something many people do anymore,” he said as he gave a recent tour of the galley and workshop of his Kendall Street home. “I think there is something special about recycling wood, giving it a new life.”
Discipline — and ease
On a recent mid-week day, under cloudy skies but with plenty of warmth, Braithwaite was up on a small scaffold on his front lawn, using some of his small chisels to work on an enormous remnant from a 150-year-old maple tree, which had been cut down in spring on a Granby street not far from his.
“People know I like to have old wood,” said Braithwaite, explaining that town DPW workers brought him the tree trunk, which stands about ten feet tall; he dug a hole in the lawn to accommodate it. So far he has carved multiple faces and figures — human and animal — into the piece, which he calls “Out of Many, We Are One.”
Pointing to a natural heart-shaped abutment on the trunk, he laughed and said, “When I saw that, I said, ‘Yeah, I have to have this.’ I don’t refuse good wood.”
A portable CD player propped nearby was playing reggae music, and Braithwaite was wearing a rasta hat and a Bob Marley T-shirt (a large banner of Marley playing an acoustic guitar hangs on the outside of his workshop). His connections to Jamaica are still strong; he visits there annually, and he has an easygoing manner and laugh, punctuated by the occasional “Yeah, mon.”
But Braithwaite says Jamaican culture and family life is also built on strong discipline; his parents expected him to work hard and make constructive use of his time. They also expected he would pursue some kind of career “like a lawyer or businessman” and were not thrilled when he told them, at about age 14, that he wanted to be an artist.
“They laughed at me,” he says, chuckling a little at the memory. “But I was serious.”
His interest in wood sculpting, he notes, grew out of taking wood-working lessons in school, where he first learned to handle tools and make simple things like a wooden piggy bank. He taught himself the rest, making some early, small carvings of birds with just a knife; he still has some of these pieces in his studio/workshop.
He later studied at a Jamaican art school, winning some awards and scholarships. He visited the U.S. in 1970 at age 20 — “I wanted to see what the country looked like,” he says — then came back for good in 1974, living at first in Brooklyn, N.Y. and northern N.J., then migrating to the Valley in 1982 after meeting his first wife, who is from Holyoke.
Over the years, he has taught wood sculpting at Holyoke Community College (HCC) and at area elementary and high schools, and his art has landed in galleries and exhibits across New England and in other parts of the country. HCC has a permanent collection of Braithwaite’s pieces on display.
His work can be seen overseas as well: The Jamaican government has installed samples of it in its consulates around the world.
Totems and tree stumps
Standing like sentinels at the entrance to his spacious backyard are two of Braithwaite’s biggest creations: large totems, around ten feet tall, carved from maple. They provide a fitting entry to the backyard, where he has fashioned an expansive sculpture garden; numerous examples of his work, positioned amid trees, bushes and flowering plants, adorn the space.
Alongside a fence on one side of the yard, there’s also a huge pile of tree stumps, logs, gnarled roots and other pieces of wood. He finds much of this material on walks through area forests, and some further afield; he prefers hardwoods like maple, black walnut, cedar and ash, though he occasionally carves from pine.
He taps a number of sources for his work. There are sculptures and reliefs inspired by Mayan, African, Caribbean and Egyptian art, for instance — one of his pieces is called “King Tut” — as well as depictions of famous religious figures, like Saint Patrick. Images from the natural world, particularly birds, also figure strongly in his art.
“I do like birds,” he says, smiling. “So many of them make their homes in trees, so there you have a connection.”
If there’s an overall theme to Braithwaite’s art, it might be one reflecting his approach to finding peace in simplicity and taking life one day at a time. In addition to teaching at HCC for many years, he also worked there as a janitor — and felt no embarrassment at doing what some would consider a menial job for a talented artist.
“When he was on Earth, Christ was a carpenter,” Braithwaite told the Associated Press in a 1999 interview about his work.
And when he leads workshops on wood sculpting, particularly for younger students, Braithwaite doesn’t just talk about technique or using tools safely. “I want to know how you feel about the work, what’s happening in your life,” he says. “We talk about life.”
The importance of those ideals came back to him six years ago when he suffered a serious heart attack and spent a week in a coma. When he woke up in a room at Bay State Hospital in Springfield, he says he at first didn’t recognize any of his visitors, including his then-girlfriend (now wife), Sheila, his ex-wife and two sons, and his grandchildren.
Today he says he feels much better and is eating more wisely. “I am rich in health, if not in money,” he says, laughing.
And he hasn’t lost any energy for working, or for talking about the spirits of the trees. He relates a story about how, when he worked at HCC, he once printed the message “Go kiss a tree” on small pieces of paper and posted them all over campus as he did his nightly janitorial rounds.
“If even a few people took that message to their hearts, it is a good thing,” he says.
Steve Pfarrer can be reached at spfarrer@gazettenet.com.
Elton Braithwaite’s website is eltonwoodart.com.