Creating a New Craft Culture by Kelley Padrick
The American Crafts Council’s biennial thought leadership conference happened in Minneapolis in October of 2009. The theme of the conference was, “Creating a New Craft Culture,” and I attended it largely because of an article printed in American Craft magazine by author, sociologist, and co-founder of the New York Institute for the Humanities at New York University, Richard Sennet, which outlined the premise of his book, The Craftsman. In it, Sennet identifies a fundamental human desire to do a job well for its own sake, whether handcrafting an art object, writing elegant software code, or conducting medical research. This broader definition of craft, discussed within the context of traditional studio craft disciplines, resonated strongly with me, as it has been a subject I have been personally engaged with since purchasing a small crafts gallery in 2008 and merging it with my marketing communications practice.
This broader, more inclusive, definition of craft attracted a curiously diverse group of academics, curators, graphic, interior and industrial designers, architects, studio craftspeople, entrepreneurs, indie crafters, gallery-owners, and political advocates, ready to grapple with issues relating to the economy, culture, social responsibility, sustainability and design.
In his keynote, Sennet, defined craft as an environmental, sustainable set of practices, which not only must accommodate product-driven development, but also research, experimentation, and the reflection of the maker. He warned of how many of our systems are designed to focus on delivering short-term economic benefit vs. quality, and how this was neither sustainable nor desirable—as clearly evidenced in our recent global economic meltdown. He shared that highly influential open source coding languages like Linux came into being based upon experimentation and the pursuit of quality vs. the monolithic, obligatory 1.0, 2.0, 3.0 software releases driven by profit incentives. In academics, he pointed to the reliance upon standardized tests, which reward getting the correct answers within limited periods of time. “Can you imagine what would happen to a student who was thinking, ‘B is the right answer, but C is the more interesting answer.’” Without a culture that supports open-ended exploration, experimentation, and innovation, which are hallmarks of the craftsman, Sennet said, “we are facing quite a damning state-of-affairs indeed.”
Elissa Auther, assistant professor of contemporary art at the University of Colorado, extended this line of thinking in her talk entitled, “Lifestyle and Livelihood in Craft Culture”, where she illustrated historical examples of lifestyles integrating values such as quality and craftsmanship that were succeeding at a higher level than those merely ordering their existence in the service of capital. Lydia Matthews, academic dean and professor of visual culture at Parsons, The New School for Design in New York City, discussed emerging economic models of studio practice, creative research and entrepreneurship that count as valuable, not only financial capital, but also social, cultural, ecological and physical capital. She quoted from Joseph E. Stiglitz and Amartya Sen’s work on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social progress, reiterating that what we measure indicates what we value, and subsequently what gets our attention and resources.
Several compelling case studies of highly profitable businesses based on these broader definitions of craft, quality, sustainability and social responsibility were presented during the conference.
• Kristin Marie Tombers, owner of Clancey’s Meats, sources her beef, pork, and chicken locally, and has elevated the craft of raising, butchering and distributing foods to an entirely new form. Animals are raised without cruelty roaming freely on farms. Local farmers are employed, and the carbon footprint is minimized.
• Natalie Chanin, co-founder of the American couture line Project Alabama, has started a revival of Depression era quilting and stitching techniques with her hand-sewn couture garments—which have been covered in all of the most prestigious international fashion publications, including Vogue, WWD and Elle– that are crafted with recycled and organic materials. As a result, Alabama Chanin employs a substantial network of cottage industry workers in the rural south that might have otherwise had to rely upon government assistance.
• Robin Petravic of Heath Ceramics revitalized a 60-year-old dinnerware and tile company with his wife, Catherine Bailey. As former designers for Nike and Lightsurf, they knew how introduce modern marketable designs into the product line, while retaining the craftsmanship, experience and knowledge earned over so many years by Health’s employees—some of whom have worked at Heath for over 40 years. Heath models responsible business practices as a means to long-term economic vitality and viability. The company has, in fact, experienced sizable growth in 2009, and is adding jobs.
Despite the profound optimism illustrated in these case studies, the conference was peppered with a reasonable counterbalance of information and opinion regarding the state-of-affairs of craft in America. Consumer behaviorist, and contributing New York Times Magazine writer and columnist, and author of Buying In: The Secret Dialogue Between What We Buy and Who We Are, Rob Walker, encouraged the group to view commentary on trends with a grain of salt. While he acknowledged the movement toward handcraft, spotlighting in particular the success of the Renegade craft fairs filled with homegrown indie crafters and the media attention given to Faythe Levine’s documentary “Handmade Nation”, he was careful to indicate that for every data point that might support that consumers are weary of mass-produced products, and looking for the frugal, the homey and the handcrafted, you will find equally valid examples that they are not, such as in the proliferation and demand of iPhones. Walker commented that the most meaningful way to look at this data is as a natural tension that exists between our conflicting desires as consumers, and even as humans. We want mass-produced stuff, where it makes sense AND we want the unique, one-of-a-kind products and experiences that satisfy our need for independence and authenticity.
Balancing tension between seeming opposites was a consistent undercurrent at the conference, as the old guard of seasoned, highly educated national museum curators and academics mixed with iPod cozy crocheting DIY indie-crafters and Martha Stewart supporters. Writer, commentator, former gallery owner, curator and author of nearly 50 books on ceramic art, Garth Clark’s come-to-Jesus presentation, criticizing the American Crafts Council for being out-of-touch, and confessing his own regrets over his lack of leadership during the artworld’s “Palace Period” from 1980-1995, and his recent creative epiphany at Burning Man, had the young believers lining up to the mic in adulation during an extended Q&A, and the old guard lining up to denounce his heresy. Even the founder of the highly experimental Laboratory of Art and Ideas at Belmar, which presented random art topics, like Kristin Marie Tomber’s Meat Fabrication talk juxtaposed against formal art and design subjects such as Prairie School Architecture, called the folding of his organization into the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver, and his appointment as the museum’s director, “like the class clown turning into the class president.”
But if we return to Rob Walker’s message: that of realizing that the goal of analyzing behavior—especially the tensions between conflicting behaviors—is to create some kind of resolution in the interest of expanding the conversation and our understanding of craft, then we can view all of the differing views expressed during the conference as contributing the vibrant patchwork as we create this vivid, new craft culture.
