text: "Coral Reef Vessel" by Steve Miller | ArtFields Art Competition
  This piece is a wood turned Maple hollow vessel, which has been carved and textured using high speed dental tools, followed by multiple layers of dry-brushed acrylic paints. The finial is also from Maple, created using the same techniques, with the addition of pyrography for texture.
  I am a retired Police Sergeant from Miami, Florida, moving to the mountains of North Carolina in 2009. I have been a woodturner since 1998, currently specializing in highly carved, textured, and colored wood vessels sculpted from local trees. When first observed by many people, my pieces often appear to be ceramic or glass, and it gives me great satisfaction to explain that everything I make is wood.
  My process focuses on wood turned, hollow vessels, turned from plain wood with little or no figure, which I like for the large surface areas for embellishment. The end result is, hopefully, a form or vessel that has the warmth and tactile qualities of wood, with the visual punch of a painting.
  My vessels and sculptures are rarely functional; they are meant to hold only your attention, purely celebrations of color, texture, and form.