Massive oak tree felled along Beaufort River. See how an artist is giving it new life
A professional chainsaw artist is carving a 21-foot-tall work of art along the Beaufort River that boaters will find hard to miss.
The sculpture, being carved from the inner parts of an old laurel oak tree, is so big that Chris Lantz of Extreme Sculpting had to erect scaffolding as he works on the upper reaches. What’s emerging are two sleek great blue herons, including one that is preparing to take flight.
“We gave him a rough idea,” Steve Prochnow says, “and he took it from there.”
Steve and his wife, Valerie, a recently retired couple who moved to Beaufort from California in August, live on Verdier Road off of Ribaut Road. They hired Lantz to make a sculpture out of the remains of an oak tree they recently had removed. The tree, which was 70 or 80 years old, was so massive it took several days to take down.
“We’re looking forward to having people in the boats ride by and noticing it,” Steve Prochnow says of the curvy design that’s taking shape in his backyard overlooking the Beaufort River, with views of downtown Beaufort and the Woods Memorial Bridge.
A sneak peek photo of one of the herons, published on Lantz’s Facebook page, prompted 58 comments and 42 shares.
“It’s very pretty,” Prochnow says.
Lantz and his family traveled from their home in north Georgia to work on the project, which Lantz expects to finish next week. Chainsaws he uses to create his art come in all sizes, from one powered by a battery to the largest, which has a three-foot-long bar. He uses hand chisels and other tools for the finer details.
The 31-year-old Lantz has been using chainsaws to make art for 12 years and the work has taken him all over the country where he’s carved bears, eagles, owls, shellfish, dolphins and sea turtles. “Everything man,” Lantz says.
The cost of carvings can range from $200 to $25,000, and Lantz says he works with the budgets of customers to come up with a design they’ll love.
Chainsaw carving runs in the family. His father and two uncles became chainsaw sculptors in 1989, a year before Lantz was born, led by a Florida preacher who felt led by God to teach them how to carve, Lantz said. Twenty years later, Lantz began his own journey. Since then, his work has earned him numerous awards. The Prochnows tracked him down online.
“The more complex,” Lantz says of the projects he enjoys the most, “the better.”
Carving herons out of the oak tree fits that bill, he says. For one, oak wood is hard, and working so high off the ground also slows down the job.
At the job site Thursday, Lantz looked down from his perch on the scaffolding surrounding the tree, where the herons were coming to life, shaped in a feathery detail that seemed to belie his big noisy tools. Chunks of wood that he had carved from the dead oak were in a pile.
Lantz is carving the sculpture in one piece, he says, which adds to the difficulty.
The Beaufort project could end up being one of his best, Lantz says. “It’s not every day people want to get 20-foot trees carved,” said Lantz.
Capturing one of the herons as it’s about to fly, Lantz notes, will impart motion, so it isn’t just a lifeless sculpture. He lives for those projects where his clients give him artistic freedom.
“Wood sculpture,” he says, “is purely an art of subtraction.”
This story was originally published February 26, 2022 at 4:55 AM.
