I've been doing more reading for the Thinkng Through Craft book review and Chapter 2 on Material, unlike chapter 1 has been pretty hard going:This chapter is about the relationship that a craftsperson has with the materials in which they work, and how this can define the work itself. The points that the author raises are thought provoking, but there always seems to be an inferiority complex on behalf on craft by the author and he spends much time justifying craft in the context of contemporary/ modern art.

Considering the calibre of artists/craftspeople he is discussing this is rather irrelevant. We know he is  not discussing little old ladies on Sundays crocheting macramé pot holders, who would have no interest in entering into conceptual debates of the materiality of craft as they sup their tea and biscuits. Hasn’t the “establishment” matured enough to realise that the craft-art debate is rather moot these days?

The notion of Process Art is explored and contrasted with notions of “opticality” and this makes for a very interesting discourse on the intentions of the maker. I am using the term “maker” now because I am not sure whether the author is defining the people he discusses as “artists” or “craftspeople”. I get the feeling that they are not sure themselves. He makes an interesting point that although the intentions of Process Art (where the art is defined my the process undergone to create it) and Opticality (where the focus is on the way the physical object appears to us), the resultant works had many similarities.

An inproportional amount of discussion was devoted to the material of clay manifest through a number of artists,  but less was said about the nature of materials such as glass, textiles, metalwork or wood. Adamson’s discussion of Voulko’s relationship to ceramics/ pottery excellently illustrates the maker’s debates about the material they may use, but it gets bogged down by extraneous biographical details which make this a  rather unfocused digression.

 

His discussion about Yagi Kazuo (pictured left) was much more enlightening and more focused where Kazuo’s work with chieokore no kodomo (translated as young people who are slow to develop understanding) highlights the joy of clay as material. Their experiences highlight the way in which the intrinsic qualities of the material are for many the catalyst for making in the first place. This discussion reminds us that this book has been written by an art historian, rather than a practicioner. Such a viewpoint may be why one gets the feeling of someone on the outside looking in, rather than expression from someone who is  so embedded in the making of work, attempting to articulate their  tacit understandings.

The chapter ends with a rather truncated discussion on glass artists Dale Chihuly (at top of entry)  and Emma Woffenden. which one feels could have been expanded much further and related back to the discussion on clay.  Adamson discusses Chihuly’s mass appeal in a way that makes the reader wonder whether craft can only be elevated to the status of art worthwhile when it is uncomfortable, difficult and incomprehensible by those without an art degree. While Emma Woffenden’s work is treated with more sympathy, and this is a discourse that would have been much more fulfilling had it been longer (and the discussion on clay shorter). The chapter on Material is so different in style, structure and focus from the first chapter that one wonders if this were written at an earlier/ later stage and was added quite late on in the editing process.
 

I'm working on a book review at the moment for the AHRC: Past, Present and Future Craft Research project that the Visual Research Centre at  Dundee University is undertaking. The book is called Thinking Through Craft  by Glenn Adamson, and although I am not really a craft practitioner I thought it would be interesting to do the review. Its an internal review and needs to be 3,000 words, so I'm being very diligent in trying to absorb it all. 

I'm not that far in really, only the first chapter, but already there are concepts that really resonate with me. Adamson introduces the notion that  the finished work (be it art, craft or design) is supplemental to the concept behind the work. Its the idea that the really important thing is the idea or concept, but for it to be communicated it must take on a form eg painting, design, sculpture etc, and these are forms which give physical presence and exploration to an idea. It is almost as if the artwork is a frame for the idea

He uses the excellent example of a music score. The score itself is not what audiences enjoy, it is what the score denotes and gives rise to that is is important.  Adamson takes the debate further exploring the notion of jewellery, saying it is slightly different to other forms because the human body becomes the frame for the works, and one can view jewellery also a small sculptures.

He discusses Margaret De Patta (featured left)  who left commercial design in 1941 to work with Lazlo Maholy-Nagy at the School of Design in Chicago. There Maholy-Nagy told her to free the stones from their settings, and this lead to works which challenged conventional notions of jewellery design at the time.