Published: May 24, 2006 11:09 pm         

VIDEO: Riley resident uses painstaking effort to produce beautiful works of art

Max Hoopengarner’s avocation “just kind of evolved” from hand-making the sort of tools early settlers used — spatulas, shovels, shepherd’s hooks — to fashioning beautiful knife blades of Damascus steel.

“The more you research something the more you get into it. It was the history part of it that drew me,” said the 54-year-old Riley resident.

A communications technician at Union Hospital, Hoopengarner began learning the techniques of metal work as a hobby about 10 years ago. Four years ago, through a program at Fowler Park, he got into some serious blacksmithing, which led to his creation of pattern-welded steel knife blades.

“I had to build me another building on my garage to do this,” he said, laughing.

Damascus steel is a 640-layer metal that requires painstaking effort and a tendency toward perfectionism. One knife blade takes about 40 hours of work.

As Hoopengarner discovered in his research, the technique was born many centuries ago, long before the invention of high-carbon steel that the modern world takes for granted.

“Today it’s more for the aesthetics, but back then it was used more as a technique for strengthening,” he said.

“It was done in Persia, in Europe, in Japan, in lots of places. And the thing is, there was no communication between these people. They just evolved this same process on their own.”

Hoopengarner said he spends 16 to 20 hours a week working in his garage bump-out shop, but the time goes by quickly and the effort is most satisfying.

“I sell a few pieces, yes, but anybody who likes this, who appreciates the technique, I usually say, ‘Take it,’” he said. “As I said, it’s an avocation. When it becomes a job, it becomes something different.”