Object Details
- Luce Center Label
- Here, Robert Griffith applies Damascus steel, a material traditionally used for razor-sharp weaponry, to a pastry tool. He made the knife as a graduate student when he was only twenty-four years old. It is a functional tool: the jagged wheel is for cutting strips of dough and the hook is for trimming excess from around the edges of a pie. The swirling pattern seen here is the result of an acid bath, which eats away at the steel layers, leaving the iron intact.
- Data Source
- Smithsonian American Art Museum
- Artist
- Robert Griffith, born Berwick, PA 1950
- Date
- ca. 1975
- Credit Line
- Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase
- Medium
- forge-welded and acid-etched Damascus steel
- Dimensions
- 5 1/4 x 2 1/8 in. (13.5 x 5.3 cm) diam.
- Type
- Decorative Arts
- Crafts
