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Friday, June 15, 2007

on crafts and craft making




i’ve always thought that some of the debate of art versus craft was in part due to the fact that while art had an intellectual body and a research and critical mass to phrase theories and explain intuitions, craft lacked all that.
In recent years many movements as diverse as the slow food movement or the digital craft movement have converged creating a discussion platform and within this platform crafts are being re defined, analysed and codified with a new perpective.

Most important as i see it, a language pertinent to craft and craft studies and criticism has been generated. This has the advantage of analysing crafts aesthetics in their own right without having to resort to art criticism language and codes which, putting it mildly, create dysfunctions in the evaluation and perception of crafts.
At their worst fine art codes distort and devalue crafts.

From the 90's on scholars and lecturers have been dealing not only with crafts per se but also with the interaction between crafts and other disciplines and the social and political implications of present crafts are also being researched. To add on to the intellectual ferment conferences and meetings are being held on a regular basis.


To exemplify the above here are a few links i found surfing the net:
The conference in Aberdeen in the summer. i suggest you check the paper proposals ( go to the side bar and click on view submissions) The topics are very diverse.
Here's also a very interesting blog, The Craft Research blog -real food for the thought.
The 2004 conference is also worth noting for the interesting papers that were presented. Do read the abstracts of the papers. I think they are rich in ideas and present many fascinating concepts.

I will end with a quote from Peter Dormer
theoretician and craft historian who unfortunately passed away eleven years ago.
tacit knowledge is the knowledge of a specific material learned by experience and driven by unconcious rules embeded in practice… it is a practice that demonstrates a specific set of values.


Exciting times to be living in and creating, indeed.

neki desu

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous6:17 PM

    great links , you have so much interesting stuff on your blog! thanks!

    ReplyDelete
  2. wow,is there anything that you don't do???

    By the way I found a great video tutorial for wheatear stitch.In case you are interested,the link is there in my blog.

    Regards,
    Deepa

    ReplyDelete

interaction appreciated!

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