In September 2000 I attended one of Ian Norbury's workshop when he made a stop at the Woodcraft store in Bensalem, Pa (near Philadelphia).  My writing skills are not capable of telling you how worthwhile Ian Norbury's seminar is.  If you are within 300 miles of his next tour of the U.S., beg, borrow, or steal the funds to get there.  Even though they were probably tired of hearing about this thing, I had friends at work who commissioned me for carvings to help fund my trip to Philadelphia.  I would like to thank them again here.  The poor wretches ended up hearing ten times more about it after I got back!

This torso was one of seven projects offered to his students.  I consider nudes to be one of the most challenging carving projects there is.  What makes it really tough is there are many more qualified 'experts' on nudes than say wood ducks <grin>.  The project started out as one piece of basswood with front and side profiles cut out on a band saw.