SWAN QUARTER — MATTIE Arts Center in Swan Quarter is welcoming back one of Hyde County’s finest decoy carvers.

Gregory Berry, an Engelhard resident, is coming back for a second year to instruct a small group of six participants on how to carve and paint a full-scale canvasback decoy.

The class is comprised of nine two-hour sessions throughout the month of January, and the participants will be creating the decoys in the art center’s Down Draft Studio.

Judy McLawhorn, director of the MATTIE Arts Center, said the center had to cap the class at six participants because of the nature of the work. The woodwork creates a substantial amount of dust, so the group needed to be small for the studio equipment to accommodate and filter out the dust.

Each station in the Down Draft Studio has a dust port that drafts air into duct systems, as well as carving tools, glass etching equipment and safety gear.

“Our mission is economic development and community support, especially for emerging artists and artisans here in Hyde County,” she said. “Our purpose is to try to provide a venue for our local people here in Hyde County for their work to be seen and their talents to be shared.”

“He is an example of someone who has never instructed before, and this is his second opportunity to instruct with us,” McLawhorn added.

She said Berry, who is employed with the North Carolina Department of Transportation, is one of the top experts with his craft and hopes to focus on it more after retirement. He has been decoy carving since childhood.

The art center’s volunteers think it is a real opportunity to work with such a talent, according to McLawhorn.

“He is thought of very highly here. … A lot of people here in Hyde County have purchased some of his works,” she said. “It’s quite an opportunity for them and to have a venue in which to do it like our laboratory (Down Draft Studio).”

McLawhorn said she thinks the class fits into the center’s theme of supporting local artists and will also be a valuable experience for those involved.

“For us to have the kind of art center we have in Hyde County makes it such that people down here in Hyde County can (go to classes) without having to drive two hours,” she said.