2025 Featured Artist of the Year
Shaun Webber
My name is Shaun Webber age 35, owner / creator of County Line Carvings LLC. I have been and Artist across many types of mixed media for over 22 years. A long path of Art exposure mixed with interest, and hands on experiences ranging from photography, oil painting, acrylic painting, concrete and epoxy sculpting, wood working, and much more!
Growing up in New Jersey our surrounding areas were very dense in population, along with vast amounts of Art Culture. Being so close to New York City, and Philadelphia at a young age surely helped peak my interest in a wide range of artworks. Between Art Galleries, the internet, magazines , books, skateboarding, and road trips. With endless amounts of inspiration everywhere I began to connect more dots of the Art - world , constantly increasing an appreciation with excitement towards making as much of my own art as possible.
The first main source of using my Art to express freely, while also support my life financially came in the form of "Body Art " professional Tattooing was the peak of my interest, and very relatable. I began the journey of an apprenticeship, then spent over 7 years as a Professional Tattoo Artist. From the moment you step into most Tattoo shops, you become engulfed in different types of Art work from all over the world. A typical day in the life would consist of - waking up from a long night of painting, then working on custom sketches due for the tattoo work day ahead, spending hours with each client of the day transforming their bodies as a canvas with ink and needles to create living breathing artworks. Followed up by another long night of paint for many hours. While fully invested in the very busy realm of tattooing, I began to seek a much more active / physical form of creating that has other ways of expressing feelings.
I spent a few years working with an awesome crew of Zoo / Aquarium fabrication artists from many different art backgrounds. During this time I also dove deeper into the wonderful world of woodworking, or woodcraft ! Working as a fabricator was a wild adventure to say the least, with tons of extreme hard work, also came with lots of freedom sculpting/ designs new materials such and concrete, and epoxy resins to create real life animal exhibit experiences. This job had its share of restrictions on art as a whole, but was a job to support my growing interest in woodworking.
With wood, my first interest was in the utility / usefulness of most builds, and how with some measuring cutting, planning you can end up with something very simple, like a shelf, stool or even a spoon to cook with everyday. To create these useful items has a powerful feeling to the creation process, and the end results, I was hooked in deeper. While working as a fabricator I would set up at farm markets selling my handmade wooden goods, hand painted signs, carving as many spoons by hands as I could keep up with.
Being a parent of 2 boys, we know how much we needed to grow and expand our homestead knowledge, and experience... We left the coast line of busy dense N.J. to settle here in beautiful Floyd, County V.A. to slowly start building and homestead, along with a new woodcraft Business. I began to rapidly dive deeper into the world of a more specific type of woodcraft - Chainsaw Sculpting ' and power carving ! For me this includes many layers of fabrication, painting, and of course the excitement of using aggressive power tools of all kinds to achieve desired looks and end results. I thoroughly enjoy this pace of working on Art. Basically able to work on these sculptures at any time, for any amount of time has some huge advantages to the potential endless outcomes. This is by far my favorite combination of mixed media in my experiences.
I am so grateful for all of the wood sculptures that bring joy to new hands, homes, and businesses nearby, and across many states. I am trying to increase my skills and approach to each new carving. Learning little by little with the power of " trial and error ". Enjoying the limitless potential of power carving, I can't wait to see what future sculptures come from my hands, and tools. Excited to bring joy to as many collectors as possible.
Thank You to Floyd County Center for the Arts for being a hub for our artists community. You have been and continue to support a wide range of artist like myself, we are extremely grateful !
