After writing the blog I posted yesterday concerning accessibility in art, I got into a very real dialog about the practice of craft making versus the practice of making art. Here lies a very fine drawn line. It is broken and scattered, and yet it exists.
The practice of making craft requires the honing of skill in a particular medium. There is not doubt that there is great skill in the knitting of a cabled aran sweater or a a well sewn quilt or garment. A beautiful cake, or fine jewelry are not things without artfulness either, but it is where one weighs in more than the other. A cake can be a functional object, it can also be a sculpture. A piece jewelry can be more than something worn as an ornament for the body. Herein lies the difference: intent. Even an artful wedding cake is a crafted and methodical item made to be eaten. A wedding cake placed in a gallery as an exercise in watching the decomposition of a symbol of modern marriage is far more than just the crafting and eating of cake.
Add yet another dimension: There is craft in art, and there is art in craft. Great art is reinforced by the artist’s skill within their craft processes. A truly good sculpture requires that the artist has honed their skill within the craft of their particular medium. The art making process requires that the artist becomes specialist in the craft of their medium. On the other side, a good craft item requires artfulness, and can be one of a kind. A well knitted aran sweater (to bring this example back) requires a fine skill in determine a certain aesthetic layout for the cables that are to be crafted to create the sweater. A beautiful and artful craft is more marketable. The difference is that the crafters intent is that their item is meant to be worn, ate from, eaten, or functional in some other way.
Another key difference between arts and crafts are the economic benefits to the creators. Craft will always have a market because its purpose is to be functional. Therefore if a craftwork is determined to be artful, skilled, and well designed, it will generate an income for the crafter. Art, however, is not created to be functional, necessarily. It is created as a tool of communication for ideas. This is a critical aspect in a cultural landscape and generate revenue, but not necessarily an income. Culinary arts, design, artisan crafts, and other craft oriented areas have a viable consumer product whereas art isn’t necessarily so. It doesn’t mean that one isn’t more or less economically important, just that the places where they drive the economy are not the same.
Examples:
Sue Sturdy knit a cover for the Main St bridge in Cambridge. Is this art or craft?
Janet Morton knit a 50ft toque. Is this art or craft?
A hand painted tea cup in ceramic. Is this art or craft?
Can you identify where this line is broken or becomes scattered even more? This discussion is really a slippery slope in our conforming definitions and elite arguments in what constitutes art. How the heck can a knitting be art… and yet it is.
There are still many many more differences. These are some main highlights and I bet you could identify more. This certainly isn’t an elitist argument, but just why one needs funding over another.
Posted on January 20, 2011
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