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2023/05/11 - Guild Meeting - Lathe Based Sculptures by Roberto Ferrer

Published on 4/12/2023
Lathe Based Sculptures with Roberto Ferrer
  • Thursday May 11th
  • Zoom IRD
  • Zoom call opens a 6:15 for socializing
  • Meeting begins at 6:45 PM
  • Demonstration begins at 7 PM


RF - Gladiator Black Walnut and pigments
RF - Quauhtemoc

For the last five years, Roberto has been dedicated to the exploration and development of lathe-based sculptures.
What started as an experimental process has developed into a whole body of work full of surprises and possibilities.
During his ninety-minute presentation, members will be introduced to the technique he has developed to create his work.

With the help of a customized jig that allows Roberto to secure a grinder or a router onto the lathe, he will demonstrate
how quick and easy it can be to create a piece in a short period of time.

During this presentation, Roberto will also explain different ways of mounting the blanks on the lathe, the pros and cons
of using either side-grain or end-grain wood, and the different results you can achieve by using open or closed-grain woods.

Despite this seemingly complicated process, it is actually quite simple, and anyone with basic woodturning skills should be
able to complete a piece.

RF - Bio Sculp Quetzalcoatl

RF - Bio Pict
About our Demonstrator:

Roberto Ferrer is a wood artist, a woodturner, a demonstrator, a teacher, a husband, a father...but most importantly he is  a person who is passionate about art and wants to share this passion through his work. 

Roberto was born and raised in Mexico, where he was surrounded by art and crafts from an early age.

While drawing and painting were part of his everyday life, the love for wood as a medium was born 
in the childhood when I used to visit my cousin's wood shop. But it was the colonial and baroque 
style architecture in my hometown that sparked the desire to one day be able to create sculptural work.

His natural curiosity of knowing how things are built and how mechanisms work led him to explore different jobs such as construction, auto mechanics, body shop among other things. In his mid-twenties he started carving sculptural bowls and vessels using a limited number of handheld power tools. Although the results were somewhat satisfactory, it was hard on his body and time consuming as well.  And this is what eventually led him to pursue woodturning as a way of removing wood in a more efficient manner and to lay the base for 
the sculptural work he currently creates.

In July 2019 Roberto received a Professional Outreach Program Excellence Award at the Symposium organized by AAW.  His work was featured in the AAW journal in August 2019 as well as the October issue of the same year. In 2020 he was among the invited artists for the Professional Outreach Program Exhibition, where he presented a sculpture of his own interpretation of Quetzalcoatl, an Aztec deity. 

In recent years Roberto was invited to demonstrate at local woodturning clubs and to teach in woodworking schools.  He also began giving online demonstrations worldwide. Since 2018 he has taken part in multiple fine art shows where he has received several awards including outstanding achievement, best of category as well as best of show. 
Roberto's work now resides in major private collections across the US and Europe.

To learn more, visit Roberto's website at Ferrer Studio Fine Woodworking Art in Chicago Area (ferrerstudioart.com) and watch a PBS show featuring Roberto (455) Eye On The Arts | Roberto Ferrer - YouTube