Tomorrow begins the Youth Classic, a competition for budding artists 13-18 years old. Jim Warner, an ice carver himself, has been working with these kids and in charge of this event for many years. Twenty-five eager carvers arrived this morning for registration and a safety meeting. Jim explained exactly what they would be doing for three days. About half of them came with sketches on paper. Others had ideas of what they wanted to carve. Their homework for tomorrow is to make a 3D model from their sketches. All the tools and their functions were explained. Three of the carvers who will be assisting Jim were also present and gave information about various tools and procedures. The ratio of future carvers to instructors will be approximately five to one. It will be the instructors who will do all the cutting with chainsaws as well as strictly supervising the use of any other power tools that are needed. Safety is paramount and was expressed continuously. Keeping your site clean was stressed too; it is easy to trip over little chunks of ice that are chipped off the block.

After the tool and safety meeting was over everyone went to the site in the woods of the competition. All the blocks have been arranged in a semi-circle in one area. Some people are working in teams, some are working alone. Each team and/or single picked out which block they wanted and put their names on them. The actual work will begin tomorrow morning. Jim showed them the first step of either ironing their design on the block or “gluing” it on using water. 

Perhaps one of these young men or women will become so enthralled with the process of ice carving that they will one day compete in the World Ice Carving Championships with other world-renowned artists. It will be a lot of fun following their progress for the next three days.