Following my trip to Madison, I spent a few days in Chicago
and loved visiting the neighborhoods there. So much diversity! The Loop,
Lincoln Park, Wicker Park, Oak Park…
Again, a manageable city due in part to great public transportation and
safe pedestrian areas within neighborhoods.
While in Wicker Park, I stopped in Handmade Renegade, a shop a lot like Anthology in Madison – although this one limited itself to handmade item while Anthology also sold recycled things. I love these shops! They remind me how important creativity is to the human spirit – such expressive “goods” for sale! And both shops were full of people happily browsing, talking to one another and to the owner.
I’m not sure what the difference actually is between “art” and “craft” except in seems craft is often made in quantity while art tends to be one of a kind. But what about a print of a piece of “art?” It’s a little slippery. In addition, craft tends to have a political connotation. It can be a harkening back to the day when people made things themselves, putting time, care, and “craftsmanship” into their work. Or it can a kind of rebellion against “the man,” as Andrew Wagner of American Craft Magazine puts it, as he describes its “inherent otherness – that is, its unique ability to set its practitioners outside of mainstream industrial society.” No wonder I am drawn to craft.
We have two stores in town that are somewhat similar in spirit to the two in Madison and Chicago: Alternatives and the Artisans Guild. They’re right next to each other in the little strip mall in front of Publix at the Millhopper on 16th Ave. Alternatives, owned by a former museum curator who became fascinated by the work done by the women’s co-ops she encountered during her travels, features art/crafts from around the world, fairly traded. The Artisans Guild is owned and staffed by area artists who take turns shop-keeping at this store featuring their work – all kinds of work, from notecards to canvas paintings to pottery to wooden bowls to jewelry. They seem to be doing well, and I think that’s in part due to the community’s growing awareness surrounding fair trade, and the desire to support workers directly and artists in particular.
Another side of craft is the “do it yourself” part or “DIY.” This doesn’t have to necessarily spring from nostalgia for the days when things weren’t made on assembly lines by underpaid children or even from Luddite sensibilities about the dehumanization of the industrial revolution. It can just be that you like doing it, or making it. This is sometimes, but not always spurred by lack of money.
My German step-granfather, whom we all adored, had the reputation in my family for “jerry-rigging” things that ought to have been repaired or built professionally, according to the nay-sayers in my family. Others were inspired by his ingenuity and gall. He retreaded old wooden wagon wheels with garden hose, built an amazing – and crazy-looking - devise for assisting him in installing large panels of sheetrock on the ceiling by himself, built storage sheds that would have offended the neighbors if he had any, but lasted a half-century, and insisted on fixing whatever broke himself (back when things were actually fixable). All of this was inspired by frugality which was the highest of virtues for him.
I am inspired a bit by that myself, and I imagine more and more people will be in the future. This makes me wonder what kinds of practical things we might be able to create, whether inspired by DIY or by tightened belts. I love this website - Ready Made - which has some amazing projects on it that seem doable by a beginner. This 2X4 chair looks doable, practical, and beautiful.
I think more and more people are being drawn to these simple, human-infused ways of taking care of their needs – aesthetic and practical - and there is a growing appreciation for those who do this work. Another good idea whose time has come.
[photo from Handmade Renegade's website]
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