Craft vs Art (sigh)

In my own mind I've dismissed craft versus art as semantics but our Context of Practice class has been asked to address this old chestnut by picking one of 16 quotes supposedly about this subject and then write 300 words or so on whether we agree with it or not, and why.

We did a similar thing at the very beginning of this course when we were asked to find definitions of  craft that we agreed or disagreed with  - see my previous post.

I agreed with (and still agree with)  the following definition from David Revere McFadden, chief curator and vice president of the Museum of Arts & Design in New York:

“Craft, art, and design are words heavily laden with cultural baggage. For me, they all connote the profound engagement with materials and process that is central to creativity. Through this engagement form, function, and meaning are made tangible. It is time to move beyond the limitations of terminologies that fragment and separate our appreciation of creative actions, and consider the "behaviors of making" that practitioners share."

In my view the "cultural baggage" is evidenced by the snobbery that exists in this area.   And it's probably the snobbery that keeps people turning over the craft versus art issue.

An example:  Someone studying fine art at university once told me (with her nose in the air) that craft was beneath her.  At other times, however,  she's told me that she spends way too much time studying other people's art and not enough time making her own.

Not the case with me!  I spend most of my time conceiving ideas, designing objects and making them - and enjoying myself enormously.  I've also grown to accept that a little studying alongside these activities, in this Context of Practice course, is a good thing.

See!  I'm turning over the craft versus art issue myself because someone's pricked my pride!

Anyhow, back to my homework.  I've picked this quote:

™The material itself, stone or wood, does not interest me as such.  It is a means, it is not the end.  You do not make sculpture because you like wood.  This is absurd.  You make sculpture because the wood allows you to express something that another material does not allow. 

Louise Bourgeois 1988

Bourgeois was a renowned French-American artist and sculptor nicknamed "Spiderwoman" after her many spider sculptures.  She was married to Robert Goldwater, a famous art historian.  She died in 2010.

Her Wikipedia entry:
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louise_Bourgeois

Good article about her:
http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2010/jun/01/louise-bourgeois

Her "Maman" huge spider sculpture:
http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/bourgeois-maman-t12625/text-summary

I'm starting the clock on my "300 words or so" on this quote:

At first glance it's hard to see how this quote relates to craft v art but in fact,  Bourgeois is putting her finger on a fundamental issue that I have some strong views about - namely that with art, the idea should come first and the choice of material should come afterwards.

I feel the same way about this.  I've made sculptures in wood, ceramics, metal, glass and even wire, string and cocktail sticks.

I've also gone against the grain at Plymouth College of Art where the contemporary craft curriculum is structured around materials - glass, metal, ceramics, textiles.  This means:

• Students are told that they need to specialise in one of these materials because there isn't time to learn more than one set of skills.
• The timetable is organised in such a way that you're prevented from learning skills in more than one material because demonstrations in each discipline are held on the same day at the same time - and students can't be in two places at once.  

For quite a lot of students this isn't a problem.  They only want to work in one material.  But I would suggest that this marks them out as makers first and artists second - and as a result they may be limiting their chances of achieving the stardom status of sculptors such as Bourgeois.

This was one of my take-aways from the talk that Michael Petry gave at College last Thursday (6th Feb).  He's the artist but he gets craftspeople to make his stuff - one of them being the College's very own Ian Hankey.

Personally, I want to be an artist and a maker, but if I had to choose between the two, I'd rather be another Bourgeois, an ideas person.

Right now, I'm resisting pressures to specialise in a single material.   I work in glass, ceramics and metal and mix them in some cases.  

In my current project, for instance, I've made a steel mould to create a glass figure that I've then used to make lots of ceramic clones (see http://www.peter-heywood.co.uk/work_details.php?id=40&s=0) . I guess you could say that I am a Bourgeois because I had to ask technicians to help me make the steel and glass aspects of this project.

I think there's another twist on the issue of using wood for sculpture that Bourgeois misses in her quote.

I seldom come up with an idea and decide to make it in wood.  More often, it happens the other way around - I obtain an interesting piece of wood and that triggers an idea.

For example, take a look at my web page for "The Music Goes Round and Around",  my largest wooden sculpture:

 http://www.peter-heywood.co.uk/work_details.php?id=15&s=0

This started out as a part of a cherry tree that fell over in my neighbour's garden.  I knew cherry wood looked nice when it was polished up and the top part of the trunk, where the branches fan out,  looked like pipes.  That got me started.     

So I made the sculpture because I liked the wood, an "absurd" suggestion according to Bourgeois.

513 words!