The man behind Lake Baldwin Park's trees

Leaves crunch under footsteps as you cross though the small black gate bordering Lake Baldwin Park. Parking lots and bustling streets are behind you, but ahead lies a land filled with the simpler things in life: a lakeside oasis filled with frisky puppies and a playground scattered with giggling children. But a secret held in the trunks of the tall shading oak trees scattered about Lake Baldwin Park is where the park takes on a life of its own.

Human faces and animal forms stare back at you, hand-carved into the tree trunks. It’s an art gallery set in the most organic form.

David McCallum, a daily attendant and volunteer at Lake Baldwin Park, is the artist behind the intricate tree carvings.

For about eight years, he has come to the dog park section of Lake Baldwin on a daily basis. He would come with his recently passed dog Babu and spend anywhere from 15 minutes to six hours either relaxing, socializing or working on art projects.

“A friend of mine years ago told me about a dog park on Lake Baldwin and I came and checked it out and realized that this is the lake where I learned to swim on when I was 8-years-old,” McCallum said, adding that he’s been coming back ever since.

Each piece is inspired by different parts of McCallum’s life. As a child, he lived in Europe until he was 8. His school years were spent in Orlando when his father retired. At age 17, he traveled all over Europe, the U.S, Canada, Mexico and South America until he was 27 and had started a family.

He came back to Orlando from Venezuela when his eldest daughter, out of four children, was starting to go to school. This was also the age at which he started to get back into making art.

“I’ve always done art ever since I was a little kid. My earliest memory is carving piles of dirt, just shaping stuff. I had two aunts who were both artists that encouraged me and supplied me with painting supplies so I did a lot of painting. Acrylics mostly,” McCallum said. “There was a time where I didn’t do much art at all because I was doing other stuff, traveling and that wasn’t my focus. Later I started carving again doing everything from raku pottery to woodcarvings, making jewelry and now I do a lot of carved rocks.”

Trees were not his usual canvas, but he was inspired by photographs shown to him by a friend, of trees in North Carolina covered in faces. Each carving is unique and can take anywhere from one hour to one week to make. The 23.16 acres of Lake Baldwin Park is his sole sprawling canvas.

Most of his carvings have to do with his shamanistic and spiritualistic outlook in life. He enjoys carving animals to honor different animal tribes and stout goddesses honoring Mother Earth as an actual living entity.

Many trees contain faces; and within them different expressions. McCallum said that faces are something he sees often if he closes his eyes for an extensive amount of time. At times they look directly at him, while other times they are looking away. He uses these as inspiration and carves them into the trees.

Sometimes the trees themselves inspire his artwork. One tree was struck by lightning and so he decided to carve an alarmed look on the face of that carving. Just around the trunk a dragon, surrounded by lightning bolts, has managed to capture one.

His favorite carving is the one that he dedicated to Babu because it reminds him of her and the memories they shared throughout 13 years.

Many people support the art he does and appreciate the work he does for the park as a volunteer.

Carla Lubet, a retired dog owner who is the treasurer and secretary of Friends of Lake Baldwin Park, said she and other dog park visitors greatly appreciate all that David does for the park. He always gives back and is there everyday to help out with things that need to be done.

“Dave is our handyman and artist. He’s always fixing stuff. Anytime we have a hole in the fence or a missing piece on the water, we go ‘Dave! Dave!’” Lubet said.

Before his retirement, McCallum had a high-rise maintenance business, using mountain climbing gear to repel off the sides of buildings to wash and fix windows. Now he spends most of his time doing different art projects.

“Good thoughts, good words, good deeds, it’s pretty simple. ‘Do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do’ is my philosophy,” he said.

He said that he is connected to Lake Baldwin Park and loves that he meets all sorts of people with every possible background, lifestyle and nationality while he’s there.

McCallum said he has a lot of history with this park, whether it be with memories from when he was a child, or from coming here with his own kids or with Babu. Being an artist has always come naturally to him from a young age, he said, so carving trees with his spiritual influences is a way he gives back to his beliefs and the park.

“This is where I hang out. I’m a volunteer here and spend a lot of time here,” he said. “It was kind of a give back, you know the park has done so much for me and means so much to me that it was just a matter of putting a little energy back into the park.”