Far from horsing around

Young Chang

NEWPORT BEACH -- The retired shipyard worker wasn’t used to this.

Red wine in the afternoon, chunks of bleu cheese on a platter, friends

buzzing about art and the reason for it all: him.

John McKenzie doesn’t even call himself an artist. Craftsman will do,

he says. Now retired, he spends his time carving and restoring carousel

animals, so maybe woodcarver would work, too, he decides.

As the 55-year-old sat somewhat overwhelmed Saturday, the Uphoffs --

his friends and longtime clients -- walked visitors through their Newport

Beach home to boast about how McKenzie had restored both Farrah Fawcett

Filly, a decorated ivory-colored horse, and Harry the Horse, a piece from

1907.

“She names everything,” John Uphoff said of his wife, Joyce.

Joyce Uphoff, a retired school teacher, is a longtime fan and buyer of

carousel horses and other figures. She and her husband met McKenzie about

four years ago after they saw one of his pieces at a Seal Beach store.

They asked about it, learned McKenzie did restoration work and then

trusted him to fix up Farrah and Harry.

“He saw things I didn’t see,” said John Uphoff. “A saddle with

feathers, how the [horse’s] face had veins. He knows how to look and see

what he wants to do and then he does it.”

Over the years, the couple grew to admire McKenzie as an artist and

regretted that his work wasn’t better known. On Saturday, they threw the

informal open house exhibit for the pieces he had restored -- and made,

in the case of a carousel rabbit.

“He works so hard and he’s such a great guy,” Joyce Uphoff explained.

With each carving or restoration taking between 250 to 300 hours to

complete, and with the selling price of each figure being about $4,000,

the couple also wanted to offer McKenzie a bit of an emotional reward.

When asked whether he ever expected the spotlight, McKenzie simply

nodded because the lump in his throat got in the way.

He first grew interested in carousel horses through his older brother,

who bought them as a hobby. Ten years ago, McKenzie began taking classes

in carousel figure restoration and, soon after, classes in carousel

figure-carving.

“I really appreciate original American history and carousels seemed to

fit with my interest,” the Seal Beach resident said.

Having grown up riding carousels in carnivals that traveled through

his hometown in Tennessee, McKenzie said the horses remind him of his

childhood.

“And I have an appreciation for what it took to create them,” he said.

“The people that actually created these weren’t just woodworkers. They

were actually artists.”

McKenzie continues the artistic tradition, albeit in his one-man-show

way. He’s carved five figures and restored about a dozen. He’ll travel to

a friend’s garage in Orange to do the carving, and then visit another

friend’s garage in Costa Mesa to do the painting.

His finished products seem to echo even the music of old-school

carousels.

Farrah is a creamy white with Tiffany-blue chest straps and a

bald-eagle design saddle. A brass pole runs through her, as if she was

taken straight from the carnival.

Harry has a milk chocolate brown body, a dark-chocolate mane,

intricate reins and straps and real, re-plated brass horseshoes.

Clint and Sue Owen, once neighbors to McKenzie, admired the pieces

Saturday.

Studying the craftsman’s gray carousel rabbit -- whose feet were

carved in a leaping motion -- Clint Owen said, “We’ve watched John’s work

develop.”

* Young Chang writes features. She may be reached at (949) 574-4268 or

by e-mail at o7 young.chang@latimes.comf7 .