User:LV/NOTES
David Gauntlett: ‘Making is Connecting’
Chapter 2: The meaning of making 1: Philosophies of craft
In this chapter we will talk about online craftsmanship (traditional and innovative). Creativity and craftsmanship have been separated in time, which is not needed according to Peter Dormer. Art has gotten a higher position than craftsmanship, but this is something you can change for yourself. Richard Sennet argues that thinking is also a great part of crafting; crafting is not only making, and you also put your identity in your work. Ellen Dissanayake accentuates the ‘Joie de vivre’, the fun of creating something out of nothing. According to Dormer the act of crafting has remained standing because of the joy you get from the understanding you get in the process. Crafting is a natural expression, vanuit je roots, without any annoying artcritic that have to ‘approve’ your work. William Morris and John Ruskin brought op the community in crafts, which is actually quite a recent development. Ruskin was born in 1819 while Morris was born in 1838, Ruskin was an artist, critic, thinker and writer. Ruskin was against industrialism and the exploiting capitalism (a conservative person). Though he was political nor left nor right, he just wanted to go back in time. He was a patron for an individual economy, (1 voor alle, alle voor 1). Also did he believe in happiness without money, the current society sucked at this and needed to change. His rigorous statements in his essays ‘Unto this Last’ shocked people. ‘The nature of Gothic’ written by Ruskin (also a revelation for Ruskin), got the attention from Morris. Morris was fascinated by the gothic style, because the creations embraced imperfection but were made with great though. According to Morris you should do what you can do in your own powers and do not fear failure, don’t try to create perfect things, this makes you inhumane. In his time he witnessed people getting turned in to slaves of the machine. Working at an assembly line in a factory was dreadful and not stimulating at all. Nowadays this critique is known by the name Marx, but Ruskin got there before him. Marx and Ruskin both feel the same way about the assembly line, it is inhuman, but Ruskin focuses on the fact that the creativity in making that is being taken from them. Often Ruskin was misinterpreted by his readers, because of their presuppositions. The worker and the thinker should not be separated; they should come together in the process of making. Marx came with a more realistic plan for a better eco-system and Ruskin’s solutions were found unrealistic. Individualistic expression is so vital, that when it gets buldozerd by a rational system the whole system sucks. In that though, Morris started a creative community where people could finally be individuals again. He had this fascination for the Mid-centuries, where everybody could be a creative individual. The though that one day it was different than now, better than now, gave him hope. Morris though that by practicing al kind of crafts he could understand this better. He started a company where people could put effort and time in their creations (like home decor and print). Eventually the elite could only afford his products, while this was not his original plan. Allen Lane did succeed in this concept (affordable luxury products), with the Penguin Books. By putting this crafted luxury product on the market Morris wanted to make a change in the industrialistic society. It was a way of showing that there was another way. Morris expressed his utopian vision through multiple channels and kept hoping. Theodor Adorno couldn’t believe that people could be so ridiculous to enjoy this industrialized culture. He plainly spoke that people were stupid, while Morris at least gave them hope and solutions. Morris witnessed the pollution by industrialisation and saw science not help where it could have. This makes him 140 years ahead of the current debates. Nowadays the WEB 2.0 is the place where Morris dreamed of. Morris gave us a push in the right direction and left it in our hands. Creating something gives hope of –rest, -achievement and –effort. Creating connects the body with the spirit. Some people can’t understand this because they are trapped in toiling (slaven) work. Rich people thin material shows wealth, but wealth is using/enjoying nature in the most respectful way. Wealth is also sharing knowledge; just like nowadays exists in the WEB 2.0. Arts can be good when combining craft&ideas, according to Morris, you can’t possibly do the one without the other. Nowadays ‘art’ seems to be only about status, in the past it was hard to climb to the top but now you can use the WEB for that. Morris would have been happy about the sharing options we have nowadays, like YouTube, not like the elite ArtReview magazine. A community is a combination of individuals, (just like in the WEB 2.0)
Chapter 3: The meaning of making 2: Craft Today
In this chapter we’ll talk about how the ideas of Ruskin&Morris turned into the nowadays known DIY culture and the philosophy, and then extract a new definition of creativity. In the 18th century the meaning of the word ‘craft’ was ‘a political, sly approach’, in the last quarter of the 19th century the word ‘craft’ as we now know raised. Craft has a web of elements: decorative (being excluded from fine arts), vernacular (natural, community, everyday), politics of work (expression through objects). The combination of the 3 made the Arts&cCrafts movement, a group of people built on the ideas of Ruskin&Morris, where all work was equal and had individual expressions close to self. Arts&Crafts starts in 1887 and ends with the WW1, it is connected to romantism, individualism, community and self-reliance (America), and was according to Greenhalg the perfect combination. It is similar to the contemporary crafts and the WEB 2.0, with a practical, positive and ethical message creating physical and mental freedom. The dehumazing industrialism got rejected and resulted in expensive crafted products, which then got rejected by the Americans with the DIY culture. Gustav Stickley started a magazine (in America) about Ruskin&Morisses philosophy and posted his own chair design for people to build and by doing that, started the phenomena ‘open source’. This democratic approach fits the ideals of the Arts&Crafts movement (craft=more important than design), DIY is the Americanised Arts&Crafts message. Today DIY is associated with everyday home improvements, nothing political about that (<?). DIY emerged in the 1960’s in a counterculture, which believes (according to Alan Watts) that our education system gives to much abstract info and teaches not the fundamental things in life. This was said during a scientific congress accompanying a LSD fanatic (Leary), a beat poet (Ginsberg) and a poet/environmentalist (Snyder), not the typical people. This attitude against the educationsystem came from Jon Holt, he argues that learning became machine, which does not work, and then home schooling (DIY) emerged, where children could develop their own interest. Also important” Stewart Brand and his book (The Whole Earth Catalog) full of resources to DIY (gardening, building etc.) Brand uses the phrase ‘whole earth’ because of the picture that came from NASA for the first time, raising consciousness about limited resources. His catalog supports self-education and later in his life he became a pioneer of the home computing community. His work lets us connect Morrisses Arts&Crafts movement with the counter culture DIY movement. Similar but different, the lo-fi culture (influenced by punk) that rejects the popular mainstream and produces things that are less bothered with physical beauty. Amy spencer loves that people go against the grain and make alternatives, even if it sells or not. According to Spencer the online world will never beat real objects, but it has eased her life. It is nice to be able to swap real objects but producing so much is bad for the environment. Spencer likes zines because they are not for the money and show that you don’t have to accept the given culture. Important: The Riot Girl, a zine that established a ‘third wave’ in feminism, that created replacements instead of complains. This third wave feminism created zines with parodies and serious matters, later even mama zines. Betsy Greer (craftivism) argues that you can buy anything, but also could make the political choice to make&exchange yourself, that gives some crafts (knitting) a revolutionary side. People pay people to do stuff for them = bad, disempowering. Doing it yourself is good for the self-esteem. This theory may not be realistic to put in action, but it is true. According to John Naish we can’t find happiness in the things we already got but keep wanting more, this is relating to evolution and gathering stuff for survival. Even though we know about the environmental issues we keep buying new things instead of reusing. Crafting can help us with this problem, re-use stuff and connect with each other, make an effort to reprogram ourselves. This can also be done in the media, by people who make armature films and stuff that brings us pleasure and connectedness, because everybody can do it. For Anthony McCann crafting holds a mental/social level (crafting gentleness), and that by crafting you gain new values to make a difference in your own helpfulness and consequences. The gentle crafting spirit can become a part of all interaction in human&nature, to become more aware (of making a difference). We make our own experiences and shape our material surroundings, an idea that also arises in the ‘Slow Movement’. Carl Honre brought this to a bigger audience, he argues that we cram too much in one day and then can’t gain enough pleasure and knowledge from what we do, when we would do slow work we would increase the quality of the experiences. When you not only consume but also make, you will appreciate the everyday things more. During the WW2 crafting was strong, after that period people were pleased with the massive manufactured goods, starting this century homemade goods raised in respect because of the environmental problems. Some people experience crafting and making as a new thing (Faythe Levine) when instead this idea is over 100 years old. The book ‘Hand made nation’ documented this movement and the WEB made it possible to spread fast around the world. Important: Etsy. According to Garth Johnson the internet holds the craft world together. The Internet is a place where crafters can show their real-world objects and connect with others. Amy Carlton & Cinnamon Cooper (DIY trunkshow) wrote a craftifesto; Craft is: powerfull,personal,political and possible. Craft became more than just making, it’s also about community, the book&film ‘Hand Made Nation’ and the magazine ‘Make’ are nowadays spreaders of the DIY culture. According to knitter Sabrina Gschwandtner the rise of crafting came from the rejection of the hyperfast culture, digital technology and consumerism, people like to create something from start till end. Matthew Crawford: Working with your hands is satisfying. Deb Dormody: bookbinding is authentic and gives a personal touch. Christy Petterson: does whatever she wants. Alena Hennesy: art is boring; the craft community is wonderful network. Jenny Hart: craft is relaxing and has room for experimenting. These were all person satisfactions with crafting. In the craftworld (unlike the artworld) fame is unimportant, Amanda Soule wrote a book about crafting with family, where your products don’t spread amongst the world. Crafting can make a family bond through creativity, being creative together, parent and children painting both brings learning and bonding. Soule also highlights creative living is helpful for community’s, like making blankets for homeless people. There are a lot of different kinds of craft activities but what connects them all is the process. Rozsika Parkes argues that embroidery is both before and against feminism and that the embroider can see a positive reflection of herself in her work. Joanne Tuney argues that knitting offers confidence and is not about the endresult but about the making and creating. Marybeth Stalp found out that the family members of quilters don’t understand how quilter can put so much time in the work and that they only care about the amount of finished works. Richard Reynold finds guerrilla gardening equal, not seeking for recognition but unselflesly making the world a nicer place, with this anonymous interventions. The writer of this book found out that the definition of creativity was to easy to make during his classes so he started showing random images and asked why or why not they would be creative. Concluding: creativity is handmade, something new or redesigned. He compared 2 Star Wars posters, 1 original and 1 with added computer aliens. The original was creative and the second one wasn’t because it didn’t add something to the emotional experience (but it still has work in it). The computer animations seem to lack the ‘handmade’ but are created in a time-consuming process. Although unfair, we find it difficult to relate toe the handmade feel in this wizardry. Craftwork should be humane and create an emotion engagement. Another example that defines creativity is the individual remaking of 15 sec of the film and than stitching it all together. Although it can’t be creative because it is a derivative work, but people put in a creative effort. According to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, JESUS CHRIST, and other, the definition of creativity= things or ideas that haven’t been seen before. But this is weird because than you would have to know everything that was ever made. According to JESUS CHRIST creativity should be noticed by influential people in the field. Creativity is not an experience or a process, it just relies on begin at the right place at the right time and getting acknowledged by experts. Also he argues that the concept of ‘Flow’ (working and forgetting the world around you) is seen in all the highly creative people but is not exclusive to them (tegenstrijdigggg). The writer doesn’t agree with this high-powered creativity and believes that all ordinary people can be creative, even with fixing your car. DEFENITION OF CREATIVE: making something original, arouse emotions, output shows a personal presence. The presence of the maker in the outcome allows people to mirror and recognise personal feelings. Perhaps, not so sure, but something can’t be creative when the maker did not had any joy at making it. This joy doesn’t need to be all the time, but somewhere in the process at least. This definition of creativity is not a personal one (of the writer) but a combination of comparisments. The creativity as we use it in everyday life is outlined by the writer. Although the word creativity is overused, the definition he gives seems to work pretty well in practice. Star wars special edition is less creative than armature youtubers, because the WANT to do it and that needs to be felt.
