David Montgomery

biographical information

My meanderings have led me all over America and Europe, always working with my hands and collecting skills, techniques, materials and memories.

In college I was a figure sculptor and landscape painter, but neither of those promised an easy time earning a living. If I had known of the fine-crafts world—at that time it was new and very small—I might have plunged into it immediately, and by now I'd be one of the grizzled, founding veterans of the business. Instead I embarked for years of traveling around the country, working as a scenic artist and making props and design models for theatre and opera. In various cities I've been a cabinetmaker and carpenter, built historic re-creations for museum installation, and created special effects, animations, and miniatures for television and cinema—a job as much fun as it sounds, though I had the bad timing to enter the field just before computers started to take over that industry.

Until a couple of years ago I was making precise, elaborate, scale models for high-tech firms. By then I was married to a successful craft artist, helping her with prototypes and construction and accompanying her to shows, and imagining that there must be a way to apply my skills to something that was entirely my own. The Aviaries are what I imagined. It's satisfying to at last find an outlet for so many of the odd talents and aesthetics I've collected.

I share a studio with my frequent collaborator and wife, Karen Krieger. We attended Yale University at the same time, but didn't know that until several years later. We share a love of travel, old books, decorative arts, and a young daughter. The three of us live, appropriately, in an Arts&Crafts house in southern Vermont.