Seated wood turner David Rodgers shares Bucks Art Weeks spotlight with daughter

A seated lathe, a stack of English hardwood blanks and a daughter at his side will frame David Rodgers’ Bucks Art Weeks display in Aylesbury, where traditional hand turning meets a family story built around the same bench.

Buckinghamshire-based seated wood turner and designer David Rodgers will show at Queens Park Arts Centre as part of the Buckinghamshire Craft Guild. Members will be in attendance and offering demonstrations most days, from 10am to 4pm, during Bucks Art Weeks, which runs from 6 to 21 June and is billed as the largest visual arts event in Buckinghamshire, bringing together hundreds of contemporary artists and makers.

Rodgers has worked with wood for more than 14 years and is best known for lidded containers, turned mostly from English hardwoods. He keeps his material base close to home, using locally sourced timber that has included wood from the Ashridge Estate, and his membership list places him firmly inside the county’s craft network, with affiliations to the Society of Designer Craftsmen, Buckinghamshire Craft Guild and Heritage Crafts.

The public showing also reflects the way Rodgers has adapted his practice around health conditions. He has said he lives with Postural Tachycardia Syndrome, or PoTS, and related conditions, works seated, and makes a smaller quantity of work because he works slowly with his hands. On his maker pages, he frames that approach plainly: disability does not necessarily mean inability.

That message will sit naturally inside an event that has long spread out across Buckinghamshire’s working spaces. Bucks Art Weeks is organised by the volunteer-led Visual Images Group, and its festival footprint has drawn visitors into studios, barns, conservatories and other sites where making is visible rather than hidden away. The 2026 programme also widens the lane for younger artists through a Young Artists scheme for ages 12 to 30, with 40 free memberships, workshops, mentoring and exhibition opportunities supported by the Rothschild Foundation.

For Rodgers, the father-and-daughter spotlight lands in the middle of that wider public stage. The lidded containers, the seated setup and the shared exhibition frame all point to the same thing: a craft that keeps moving forward without giving up the hand, the family line or the room to be seen.