TURNING POINT: KERIN LIFLAND, '81

From Marx to Marquetry

WHEN KARIN LIFLAND enrolled at Stanford, he was determined to study his weakest subjects—biology and civil engineering, for example. He wanted to broaden his knowledge, become a Renaissance man. Midway through his junior year, though, he had an epiphany. Leaping up in the middle of a lecture on Marxism, Lifland strode out of class, nearly knocked over some friends in the hallway, and went straight to the art department to declare his major.

“It was pretty dramatic,” he recalls. He was suddenly struck by a need to be surrounded by sculptures, drawings, paintings—anything that was art.

Lifland still has those periodic flashes of insight—like an armoire design that came to him in a dream. Today, his chosen medium is wood. He turned to woodworking after a few frustrating years trying to paint professionally. Lifland had experimented with furniture-making as a hobby—a bookcase here, an end table there—before he decided to pursue woodworking full time. “I just found I enjoyed it a lot more,” he says. “I’m self-taught, so that works to my benefit. I feel less hampered by the taught ways of doing things.”

TROMPE L'OEIL: Intricate arrangements of contrasting wood veneers create 3-D illusions in Lifland's marquetry panels.

Douglas Hill

Lifland’s love of art and his drive to try new things converged in 1997, when a client came to him with an unusual request: design a study featuring decorative panels of Italian Renaissance-inspired marquetry.

Marquetry is an intricate combination of woodwork and art that originated in ancient times and later flourished in 16th-century Europe. Knowing nothing of the craft when he took on the assignment, Lifland signed up for a workshop, did some reading and practiced a lot in his Los Angeles studio-garage. He learned to cut segments of different wood veneers and piece them together like puzzles or mosaics to create the illusion of 3-D pictures and patterns. His palette consisted not of paints but of various types of wood in a range of natural hues and textures. After two years of painstaking work, he completed the room’s six panels, which depict maps, navigational devices, musical instruments and giant clamshells.

Mastering marquetry for the one-of-a-kind project is among Lifland’s proudest accomplishments. “I want to take on new challenges with each project,” he says. “I want to learn something with every new job.” Sounds like a true Renaissance man.

—Brian Eule, ’01