The exhibit focuses on a variety of woodworking techniques including carving, woodturning, inlays, incrustation, and wood burning. It represents the woodworking traditions in three major categories: regional, featuring famous South Jersey decoy and wildfowl carvers as well as local artists interpreting variety of themes in their wood works; religious, including Judaic, Buddhist and Eastern Orthodox displays; and ethnic, with musical instruments, masks, carved wine vessels and bowls, and other crafts from 14 ethnic cultures, including Native-American, African-American, Estonian, Japanese, Lithuanian, Ukrainian, Polish, Turkish, Bulgarian, Romanian, Gambian, and Tibetan.

Carved decoys and shore birds, a woodworking genre for which New Jersey is famous, dominate the regional exhibits. These displays will also include examples of wood turning, using such local trees as sassafras, statues and plaques, and “found” art such as an Adirondack settee made from tree limbs, not to mention oversized chain saw art. The “golden age” of decoys began between 1870 and 1880 in Bordentown, NJ, and other sites near the Delaware River. Since then decoys have become a uniquely American form of folk art, much in demand by collectors willing to pay five-figure prices for rare and antique specimens. Decoys created today tend to be decorative versions characterized by lifelike colors and intricately carved feathering.

The original  “working” wooden decoys were cruder but they still recognizably depicted such wildfowl as mergansers, brants and buffleheads, all in states of floating repose designed to lure fellow members of their species within shooting range. Often they were made by the hunters who used them and became identified by their places of origin in or near New Jersey, such as the Delaware Bay, Barnegat Bay and the Chesapeake.

The religious category will include Orthodox carved icons, altar panels and sacred vessels, Lutheran crosses, Buddhist incense boxes and religious plaques, Jewish wooden menorah and grogger.

Artisans scheduled to exhibit include: Art Parkin, Ralston “Hop” Edwards, Edgar Newell, John Lamanteer, Jr., George Brooks, Jamie Hand, Harry Shourds, Jim Seaburt, Robert Svendsen, Tom Templeton, Kenneth Carll, Lee Ayars, Frank Ono, Art Glaspey, Masaru Kazaoka, Fusaye Kazaoka, Steven Hamburger, Dmytro Sorochaniuk, David Field, Rimgaudas Pranckevicius, Vacys Kiukys, Selma Virunurm, Albert Miller, Cornelius Walker, Albert Weisser, John Cisco, Garry Ecret, Earl Polhamus, David Rosen, Sam Cristal, Brian Ackley, and Dholak.

On May 27 the exhibition will be complemented by a woodcarving demonstration (masks making) for schoolchildren by Rimgaudas Pranckevicius, a Lithuanian carver, whose works will be on display.

The exhibit and all of the other Wheaton Village attractions are included with the price of admission. Adults $10.00, Seniors $9.00 and Students $7.00. Children five and under are free.

Folklife Center hours: Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, noon to 5 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wheaton Village is open Tuesday through Sunday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., April 1 through December 31. For more information, call 800-998-4552, or visit www.wheatonvillage.org.

Wheaton Village strives to ensure the accessibility of its exhibitions, events and programs to all persons with disabilities. Call two weeks in advance for special accommodations.

This program was made possible by a general operating support grant from the New Jersey Historical Commission, a division of Cultural Affairs in the Department of State. The Down Jersey Folklife Center programs are supported in part, by grants from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a Partner Agency of the National Endowment of the Arts, the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, and the National Park Service. The Center is further supported by residents and groups with an interest in the traditional art and culture of southern New Jersey.