Rekindling the style of woodworking shows gone by, Woodfest invites people to enjoy hands-on experience and learn about the tools, skills and craft of wood artisans. From whittling to sculpture, weaving, kumiko and pyrography, the festival at the Bulli Showgrounds offers all-skills workshops, a maker’s market, live music and food stalls.

Samantha Arnull from Her Curious Studio has a unique connection to materials, and invites her workshop participants to use found objects to make a miniature impression of themselves (or someone else) as a chair.

“Chairs are almost portraits of people. So when I look at the classics like Wassily, a well-known archetype of what a chair is, they remind me of people.”

“I’ve always made them, it’s been a thing for quite a long time, and I make them from all sorts of things.”

In her home studio, a community of tiny chair sculptures are gathered on the table. They’re made of PVA glue and string, found objects, wire, piano hammers, rulers, and paint brushes. 

“Those two little green ones,” she points, “they’re from when I was a little girl.

“Since I was a kid, I’ve been collecting small things, whether it was Smurfs or tiny chairs.”

Samantha employs a process-based art practice, combining her fine art training at the Bauhaus University in Weimar with her attraction to, and organisation of found objects. 

“My practise moves between the library of objects and their relationships between themselves and each other. Sometimes I think I’m a hoarder, but not really, I’m too organised.

From floor to ceiling, Samantha’s studio is skirted by shelves. It’s like a museum backroom, housing giant shells and birds nests in respective display boxes. A fox pelt lays on the table and a set of wooden drawers is adorned in labels like ‘letters’, ‘brushes’, ‘archive tiny’ and ‘wax teeth’.

“I do very much enjoy that categorising, organising, moving those objects. And that’s kind of how there’s the happy accidents” that become her artwork, Samantha says.

“This is a collection from my life.”

Her approach is partially inspired by the way water courses sort objects. 

“When I lived in the UK and I was working with this artist, we worked on the Thames and we went mud locking,” she says.  

“You could quite seriously say, okay, I need to find a Roman tile. And you could go to a certain part of the Thames and you would find a Roman tile.” 

All materials for the tiny sculpture workshop are supplied from Samantha’s personal collection, including a selection of found objects, wood, fabric, leather, cardboard, feathers and wire–the list is endless.

“Most of the time when just when people see these boxes of tiny little things and precious items, they’re excited. 

“It’s always questions of, where did you get this? How did you find this? How does this work?” 

Samantha hasn’t always worked with wood, but it’s a material she’s always enjoyed learning about. 

“I think it was when I started making the little chairs that I got that real kind of addiction to found object wood, and not always at school or in junk piles. I’d always be going through to find the offcuts,” she says. 

“I am known to kind of borrow wooden door wedges. I collect broken musical instruments as well. I really like those.”

“At Woodfest I get to meet lots of other people like me who are so incredibly skilled. Whether it’s joinery or hand carving tiny spoons or birds, it’s a really amazing and unique catch up because it’s a small niche of people doing trades. So that side of it’s really fun. And I might learn something from them too.”

Join Samantha at Woodfest 2024 or get involved at one of the workshops

19-20 October

Bulli Showgrounds