Today I made an ugly ring

For three days, I was honored to be an attendee of the Craft Think Tank dedicated to discussing the world and future of craft – craft artists, education, collecting, making, and selling.  Brigitte Martin does an outstanding job of leading these annual retreats.  While the entire experience was incredibly thought provoking, I learned a profound lesson during one separate experience.

For 2 ½ hours, we were immersed in making something.  The think tank took place at the amazing Lillstreet Art Center in Chicago, with studios in so many media.  I had chosen jewelry, as the tools and the materials were something I’ve never tried to work in.  My hands have been hungering lately to do something – anything! – as I’ve been in a knitting hiatus and I find that working with my hands feeds a part of my soul like nothing else.  My soul was hungry.

Pam Robinson

Being a complete ignorant novice was humbling.  As I watched the demonstration by PamRobinson, an expert in her field of jewelry and an awesome teacher, I thought, wow, I can do that.  It doesn’t look so hard.

At work

You already know the end of this story.  It WAS hard, so much harder than it looks, with details and technique, familiarity and subtlety all missing on my part.  But at the end of the workshop, I, like all the other participants, had made a ring.  Mine is ugly and bumpy, a little rough at the edges where it should not be, and a slightly different size than intended. 

My ugly ring next to my beautiful ring created by Lynda Bahr

As I got over my embarrassment about my ring’s lack of beauty, I also realized two things.  My exhilaration from having made something was back.  And my respect for jewelry artists only increased.  I have always admired their work and marveled at the intricacy and workmanship, but I have a bit more understanding now and only respect them more.

Proud students showing off our work

Envy

In the business of fashion and home décor marketing, it is commonplace to photograph our wares in beautiful locales and environments, places we all wish we could visit or inhabit, places which are meant to inspire interest and fantasy, places which make our products look the best they possibly can in the hands of talented photographers and stylists

This past week I have been shooting at yet another fantastic home in Chicago, a home which someone with incredible vision built from its roots as a mechanic’s garage, a home which someone else with an over-the-top design sense filled in an Alice-in-Wonderland style.  I was floored, wowed, and filled with envy.

It always amazes me when someone goes all the way with design, taking no prisoners, worrying not at all what others might think or how his vision might translate when it’s time to re-sell the home.  I’ve always been afraid that something I might do to a home will kill its appeal for a future owner and so I am more timid in my choices.  But this homeowner, who is also a designer with vast resources, is not cut from that cloth and so has built a home with exaggerated proportions and filled it with furnishings bordering on the madcap and high and low art.

I’m not proud of my envy on these photoshoots.   I wanted to move into this home immediately, but more than that I found myself really really wanting it, feeling like I should be able to have it, alternately loving and hating the homeowner without ever meeting him, an embarrassing avalanche of feelings all rooted in envy.

And then it was time to put envy in the freezer.   I was able to sit back and just enjoy the days I got to spend in an environment I would never know as my own.  The riches and choices of this homeowner/designer were mine for 48 hours and somehow I knew I was a little richer just for being exposed to this magical place.  Lucky me.

Why Bother to Celebrate American Craft?

This week is American Craft Week, a made-up celebration about craftsmen and craftswomen and their work.  I mention that it is “made up” because several years ago, a group of people decided that it was important to try to get a larger public to notice, appreciate, and hopefully buy work created by American makers.  Although there may have originally been a commercial motive, I find far more important reasons to celebrate American craft.

Today’s society is often looking for ways to increase or stimulate creativity. TED talks focus on this.  The maker of Soylent believes that if we spend less time thinking about food we will spend more time being creative.  Mindfulness, exercise, and education are recommended to stimulate creativity.

Danielle Gori-Montanelli

But I believe that there is another source of creativity, and that it often comes from working with our hands and letting our minds loose.  The act of making requires letting the hands go to work, often letting them act as our minds, taking us to new places as objects form before our fingers and eyes.

David Patchen

Imbued in the pieces we make are our histories as well.  American craft not only reflects the talent and creativity of our culture, but also contains memories of our past in addition to the stories of our present and future.  According to Steve Fenton in Craft in America, “Objects are repositories of cultures; to understand their messages we need only open our eyes to them.”  The young makers of today may act differently from the craft pioneers of the 1970’s, but the work of both respectively reflect their times and cultures.

Meg Little

So why celebrate American Craft Week?  I believe the reason is pretty simple, that craft is a small but important, often overlooked, living and breathing component of our culture.  May the makers and artists, glassblowers and rug-hookers, woodworkers and jewelers, quilters and basketmakers, bookbinders and potters all have their moment in the sun.  Visit a studio.   Make a trip to that gallery you've been meaning to get to. Notice the handmade around you.  Celebrate.

Extraordinary: Ai Weiwei on Alcatraz

Last night we attended the massive installation “@Large:  Ai Weiwei on Alcatraz” by dissident Chinese artist and activist, Ai Weiwei.   It takes months of planning to get a ticket and is profoundly worth the wait and effort.

Created for and set in the crumbling and horrifying remains of the prison on Alcatraz Island, the installation is divided into seven parts, each with its own distinct and often visually beautiful perspective on imprisonment, domination, freedom,  isolation, and the bleak endlessness of incarceration.

A recurring technique in many of Ai’s pieces is the use of massive quantities of something, often a hand-created something in honor of his reverence for craft.  An oft-cited fact about one of the pieces in this installation, “Trace”, is the use of 1.4 million Lego pieces.  But the installation is powerful for reasons that are greatly beyond this notable quantity.

Trace is an installation depicting portraits of 176 individuals incarcerated for their beliefs, most of them still held as of June of this year.  Ai refers to them as heroes, though many people on my tour questioned certain individuals such as Edward Snowden being called a hero.  I found the effect of the Lego portraits to be profound.  It is so very easy to read about dissidents, to see them as far off from one’s everyday life, to know of them in a small, faraway way.  The first impression of these dozens of portraits is one of pixilation, difficult to identify.  And then.  Then your eyes begin to see them and take in the enormity of their sheer numbers.  The millions of pieces begin to make sense in relationship to the millions of individuals around the world whose freedom is compromised.

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Just as we began to leave “Trace”, we decided to take a few photographs with our phones and discovered that viewed through a phone’s camera, the portraits became instantly clear, the blurriness of pixilation gone, as if to reflect on how information about today’s dissidents is instantly and clearly communicated thanks to technology.  It changed the entire experience, added a deeper level of meaning.

“Blossom” takes place in the prison hospital, often a place of residence for the mentally ill, a place of desolation.  Here, Ai has filled the old discolored sinks, toilets and bathtubs with tiny precious white porcelain flowers, filled to overflowing and which at first glance could be Styrofoam peanuts.  Who knows how many blossoms there are, who knows how many cries took place in this place of horror and in others around the world?  What a contrast between these horrible porcelain fixtures and these tiny pieces of art, a contrast of purpose, a reminder that those imprisoned for their thoughts never see or receive flowers of any sort.

It is often noted that art has the power to reveal and re-color reality.  In the case of @Large, Ai does even more than that.  He explores, examines, exposes and ultimately fills us with the enormity of the commitment of individuals for their beliefs.  Extraordinary.