Page 63 - 06_September-2024

STAge
GUERRILLA CHAINSAW ART
Tim Kurucz walked into the woods a sports fan, and walked out a wood-carving artist
BY CAROLINE BARLOTT
Artist Tim Kurucz sends me a text
saying he’s available for an interview
at any point AS LONG AS THE OILERS AREN’T PLAYING. It’s written just like that with the last words all in caps.
LET’S GO OILERS, dings the next text. Granted, the same refrain rings across the city. At the time of writing, the Oilers are about to (almost) make one of the greatest hockey come backs in the history of the playoffs.
Within days, the City’s collective excitement is as palpable as Kurucz’s. He’s standing in his driveway in his blue and orange jersey and he reaches into his car for one of the many chainsaw carvings he’s created over the last several years. As he pulls it out of the vehicle, I recognize the shape of the Stanley Cup.
He shakes his head, lips pressed together, grimacing slightly.
“As I found out, after hours of searching the web — top to bottom, inside, outside, every orifice it has, you can’t find all
the proper dimensions,” says Kurucz,
his voice rising with frustration. “Sure, you can get the height, and some of it. But, I know where it’s not accurate, because I’ve looked at pictures of it a million times.”
Like many Canadians, Kurucz sees hockey as more than a game. It’s some- thing that connects him to his late father, who saw Kurucz become the captain of his Canadian Athletic Club team, and win provincials. “It is one of few moments in those last few years that I saw true utter joy from my dad,” says Kurucz. “Then, he was dead by fall from cancer.”
Kurucz’s past and present are rooted in the neighbourhood of Westridge. The land across from the home in which he’s lived since junior high school was once a pig farm. “You know what direction the wind was always blowing,” says the 61-year-old artist with a smirk.
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PHOTO RYAN PARKER