Pamela Stewart Pearson - Netsuke gallery

I began to train as a carver of netsuke when I left school and studied to become a P.E teacher. This is not as strange as it might appear as it was at college that I learnt to study movement and observe detail very closely.

As my family grew up I decided that I didn't want to continue teaching but would rather persue my great interest in plants. Following a move to Surrey, UK I started working at the Royal Horticultural Society garden in Wisley. This was another useful training for carving as very close examination of plants and flowers was necessary and it eventually lead to me opening my own small nursery.

While looking after the gardens of a stately home I started to study woodcarving, a subject which had always interested me. I became a student at the City and Guilds of London School of Art where I followed a course of Church work ie. the type of carving perfected by Grinling Gibbons which can be found in the choir at St. Paul's Cathederal and many large houses around Britain.

My woodcarving was becoming increasingly detailed and eventually, in 2002, I decided to follow this to it's logical conclusion and start to carve netsuke, although at that time I had only seen and admired them in pictures.

Most of my carvings are based on the natural world and I always try to impart as much movement into each piece as possible.. I live deep in the French countryside which provides constant inspiration. I surround myself with objects and pictures and strive to find the essence of my chosen subject; and while I always start with a clear idea I find my carvings are often subject to serendipity. I don't draw a design and I allow the wood itself to lead the carving onward. I try to include suprises so that the observer has to spend time studying the carving rather than seeing everything with a single glance.

I work entirely by hand with the help of high magnification to achieve the fine detail. I use fine rasps, gouges
and knives; the simplest netsuke take about a month from start to finish while the time needed for the complicated ones can be anything up to a year.