Tree stumps and snags get new life as artworks in Gig Harbor city parks

Wait. Did that tree stump just look back?

Some snags and stumps in Gig Harbor city parks are growing faces — and wings and claws and paws — as part of a city-sponsored art project.

The first finished “snag art” project is already on view in Grandview Forest Park — a decaying snag filled with holes pecked by birds. The hollows have been refashioned by master carver George Kenny into bas-reliefs of birds and animals that frequent the park, including an eagle, squirrels, heron, owls, and a duck.

Most artwork is designed to last. This piece is intended to decay, along with the stump, in 10 to 15 years.

“The idea is that it can still be a part of nature and the birds and bugs could still use it, but it is safer for people who are still using the park,” said Lynn Stevenson, a member of the Gig Harbor Arts Commission.

The snag art project, which the arts commission hopes to expand to other city parks, is part of the city’s Arbor Art project, which aims to install locally created art. “Snag” is a loggers’ term for a tree that has lost some of its trunk, but is more than a stump.

Many trees at Grandview Forest Park have suffered through tree laminated root rot, a fungal disease, meaning the tree has rotted from the inside. As a safety precaution, many of these trees have been taken down.

But Kenny, a carver for 25 years, saw potential in this one, which stands by the park restroom.

Kenny said once the tree had begun to rot, birds attacked it in certain areas, and he used these areas to place and carve each wooden animal.

“Instead of using a new hole we used an existing hole that was provided by the birds,” Kenny said.

Kenny and his son, Garrett, spent two days on a scaffolding in December carving the trunk. He used a smaller chainsaw in order to get the finer details, along with some hand tools, a grinder, and a burning torch to get a darker tone in certain areas.

Kenny said he hopes the carving will become a popular feature of the park.

“If there’s an item in a particular walking area that’s unusual and will catch your eye, people will make the trip to go check it out,” Kenny said. “It adds to the experience when people are taking a walk.”

Stevenson said this is the first of hopefully many Harbor Arbor Art projects in Gig Harbor.

“It is an ongoing project and there is no real deadline for it, so what we would like to do is accumulate a collection of various embellished snags throughout city parks,” Stevenson said.

With a $5,000 yearly budget, Stevenson said the city hopes to be able to offer two to three different opportunities each year, and the commission is always happy for suggestions.

“The most obvious route is carving, and we hope to get a lot of carvers involved, but we would like to encourage all types of skill levels and expressions of art,” Stevenson said. “I don’t know what that may be, but we are hoping people come to us with ideas.”

She added that each piece needs to be something that will decay over time, and the commission wants to avoid using any toxic materials.

The Grandview Forest Park piece cost $3,000, a normal price for a master carver.

Kenny has a retail shop called Bears in a Box in Allyn, on Hood Canal, along with a carving school. He said he’s done 40 onsite jobs the past year, most of them snags done in people’s front and backyards.

“What I find unusual is people will ask for a really large carving where no one will see it like their backyard,” Kenny said. “It’s kind of fun to do one that will be regularly seen by a lot of people.”