Art vs. Craft

[untonuggan]

I have always wondered about what seems to me to be an artificial distinction between art and craft. The societal narrative seems to go, "Serious artists make art, but crafts are for those homemakers who shop at Michael's every week." (Note: not that I think being a homemaker or shopping at Michael's are bad things.) Or perhaps it's because so many "crafts" (knitting, quilting, crochet, sewing, etc.) are traditionally done by women. Never mind that when you're done knitting a scarf, not only is it beautiful, it keeps you warm. It's wearable art.

I offer a brief example from a recent Washington Post review of Artomatic, a local unjuried art show.

"And Kristin Bohlander's use of sheep's wool - more sculptural than artsy-craftsy - is richly textural."

I love how the author throws in "artsy-craftsy" as though it's a bad thing. Of course, he also knocks Star Trek slash fan-art a few paragraphs later.

Does anyone else have this particular beef with knitting's typical designation as a craft? Is the word "craft" something that should be reclaimed in the way that "queer" is being reclaimed by the LGBTQ community? What is the line between art and craft?

Comments

[owlectomy]

My personal idiosyncratic definition is that "art" refers to the aspect of creation that is intuitive, creative, and original, and "craft" refers to the aspect of creation that depends on technical skill. So, Marcel Duchamp can put a urinal in an art museum and call it art, but there is absolutely no element of craftsmanship involved; and a novel can be well-crafted without being artful. A painting may be art, but the same painting would be a craft if sold in a kit as paint-by-numbers.

By that definition, the vast majority of the knitting that I do is not art. I'm following someone else's patterns, or at most I'm taking someone else's template and putting a different stitch pattern on top. (Is the pattern designer making art? Very possibly, yes!)

But there is definitely an idea of craft as a lesser thing, and that definitely has a basis in class, and I think it certainly is wrong -- in American society, I think, being able to buy your own beautiful things is a measure of status, and choosing to make your own beautiful things is a conscious rejection of that status symbol... even if it's not necessarily cheaper. Which is kinda weird.

[anatsuno]

"My personal idiosyncratic definition is that "art" refers to the aspect of creation that is intuitive, creative, and original, and "craft" refers to the aspect of creation that depends on technical skill. So, Marcel Duchamp can put a urinal in an art museum and call it art, but there is absolutely no element of craftsmanship involved; and a novel can be well-crafted without being artful. A painting may be art, but the same painting would be a craft if sold in a kit as paint-by-numbers."

This is so clearly and eloquently put! And matches my understanding as well. Thank you. :)

[sholio]

Oh man, I gotta say, this was something that made me tear my hair out in the sculpture class I took a couple of years ago at our local university. I quite liked the class in most ways, but the instructor's condescending attitude towards "crafts" as opposed to the ~REAL ART~ that we were supposed to be making in her class really grated on me. Admittedly my irritation was probably at least partly because she kept dismissing most of the project proposals that I would bring to her as being "too much crafts, needs more art" and asking me to change them -- and for the life of me I could not see where she was drawing the distinction, though it did seem that in her mind, anything involving fibers, sewing or gluing one thing onto another was "crafts", whereas making things with welding tools and bandsaws was SCULPTURE and therefore ~ART~.

I'm not really involved enough in either the fine-art world or the subculture of knitting/crochet/etc. to know how prevalent the distinction is, however, especially with that condescending undertone of "... oh, it's just CRAFTS." But I do agree with you that it seems like a completely artificial separation to me -- it's a social distinction, IMHO, and not anything inherent in the work itself.

[sophiap]

A sculptor/painter I know often prefaces talks by saying that up until fairly recent times, sculptors were primarily seen as craftsmen. He makes it very clear that this is a good thing, and that medium doesn't matter. It's how well you know your medium, what it does (or how to make it do what you want it to do), and how you use your technical knowledge to turn the vision in your head into physical form.

To make a long story short, I think he'd dismiss your instructor as an idiot.

[untonuggan]

Your teacher does sound like an idiot. Sorry that happened. (And yes, that is exactly what I am talking about.)

[pennyplainknits]

I don't, really. I'm crafting something, I'm making things that have a practical purpose and use, even if they have a decorative and artistic function as well. I don't think of my knitting as art, anymore than I think of the cakes I bake as art- both are crafts.

[clayr]

My rough idea is that art is how the end product looks and craft is about a set of skills to produce a practical product. Very rough idea :) it's a hard thing to define. My sense of it is where the focus and associations are for it. I think there's a class element to it also.

Might be my northern working class roots talking (I do live in the Heavy Woollen District), but I tend to view craft as better - something that's useful, that's practical.

[tephra]

I think we have similar roots. My art/craft division is pretty fluid but generally if it's practical and useful it's craft. If all it does is be pretty (or interesting, or remarkable, etc.), or has become so pretty (etc.) that it no longer has a practical use, it's art.

[ghoti]

this. art is for looking at. craft is for using.

[woldy]

Or perhaps it's because so many "crafts" (knitting, quilting, crochet, sewing, etc.) are traditionally done by women. I think it's a combination of the sexism you point out, class elitism, and ethnocentrism.

Over the past few centuries in the West, 'art' has been what the aristocracy pay for, and anything used by ordinary people is 'craft'. That distinction also helped Westerners to argue that non-Western cultures weren't producing real or high quality art (further evidence that they're not civilized!), so often non-Western art ends up in anthropology museums instead of art galleries. Not everybody still uses that distinction, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York includes a lot of things that others might regard as craft (e.g. the costumes and musical instruments).

I don't think there's any difference in terms of skill, or creativity, and IMHO denigrating craft shows the ignorance and prejudices of the person doing it.

...She says, wearing a handknitted sweater made by her grandma (with Lopi yarn and a Norwegian circular pattern) in the 1970s. It's keeping me warm, and it sure looks like art to me.

[untonuggan]

That's exactly what I was trying to get at. Thanks for putting it so eloquently.

[nonniemous]

Somewhen, during the Enlightenment or sometime in recent European history, I don't recall which, Western Civilization came up with the notion that "pure art" is "art for art's sake," with no practical purpose whatsoever. Which is kind of cool, because we have a huge gallery of painters that we might not have had.

However, you notice that a lot of other cultures, Chinese, First Nations, African, did not make that distinction. It caused a lot of issues when wealthy 'murricans first started bringing home gorgeous souvenirs from China and Japan in the nineteenth century. Where were we going to display these things? They were beautiful works of art--but they also had a function, a purpose, so they weren't "Art" as defined by western culture. Same battle with African art, and the same battle that a lot of Native American and First Nations artists fight today.

So there is, to me, this entirely artificial notion in our culture that if something has use and purpose--or is made of fibers or other traditionally feminine crafts, it's not ever going to be art. The Arts and Crafts movement in the early 20th century was a rebellion against this notion--I find it hilarious that their work is now displayed in museums as ART, but the "art" label in general has not been allowed for handcrafts yet. And it very much especially seems to be a battle fought by women, for traditionally feminine handicrafts.

I don't consider the use of a pattern to be a definition of not art, because cathedrals used blueprints. It's the end product that matters. Two people can use the same pattern to make the same knitted or crocheted item, and one will have made a work of art and the other simply a worked item.

(Sorry, this is a subject near and dear to my heart, and one that comes up a lot in museum studies and working with Native American art.)

[untonuggan]

"(Sorry, this is a subject near and dear to my heart, and one that comes up a lot in museum studies and working with Native American art.)"

No apology necessary! Pulling in non-Western-Civ examples is really helpful, as I am only just getting a handle on some of the history of knitting. (And as a history major, it's something I totally geek out about.)

[archane]

For me, it depends a lot on how the word "craft" is being used. I will proudly practice my craft (as with carpentry) while I knit or crochet art. I'm likely to get offended, though, if someone refers to my fiber work as 'making crafts' (as I did back in Sunday School), because it is generally intended to be dismissive of an unskilled way to amuse and pass time.

[ginny_t]

If I'm being flip, I say that men make art and women do crafts.

If I'm being serious, I say that crafting is following a set of instructions to get the finished product, and art is working without instructions or a guide.

Interestingly, the arts & crafts movement from the late 19th century is (I think) given a value that the modern term "arts & crafts" doesn't get at all. Also, arts and crafts is sometimes used to describe cut and paste that children do as they're learning to express themselves. That gets quashed in all but the most tenacious.

Wow, I had more to say on this than I thought I would. I stop now.

[suncat]

I think it hinges almost entirely around the fact whether the object is at all utilitarian. A painting that only hangs on a wall, or a sculpture that simply sits there to be viewed, have no other use and get the label "Art". A beautiful piece of clothing, a graceful glazed vase, an elaborately carved cabinet or even a marvelously formed sword all fall into "Craft". Because no matter how well they please the eye, they were made to be, and are, used.

I agree that this seems to be a conceit of the West, and likely arose because the objects that were beautiful but had no functional use were only affordable by the wealthy and so acquired status. Look at all the other things that only the wealthy could afford: crystal and precious metal table ware, finely woven and patterned carpets, fancy carved furniture, elaborately constructed houses. Yet all still functional and used, and never elevated to being Art. I much prefer the attitude of the rest of the world, that doesn't bother with such silly distinctions.

I also agree that many of the activities confined to Craft seem to be those that also qualify as "women's work", and there is an element of sexist labeling involved. But I don't think it's such a sharp distinction. I think it's more that women have historically had less opportunity to spend their time on those activities that get unequivocally labeled Art. When they do find time to, say, paint, I don't think anyone claims their paintings are "only" Craft. Even if their paintings irritatingly never are accorded the acclaim they are due for their quality, but are down-graded compared to their male contemporaries' works. That is a well-documented effect of historical sexism and can send me into a frothing tirade.

[ironed_orchid]

Yes, the utilitarian aspect is definitely something that comes into play.

Which is why discussions like this always make me think of William Morris and the Arts And Crafts Movement, who were all so invested in making useful, daily objects like curtains and chairs into something that were both practical and beautiful.

[esmenet]

I'm not sure it's an entirely useful distinction, really, and there's definitely a lot of overlap. but I would say that art is ~*creating*~ something, and craft is making something. Some sort of useful/pretty axis seems to be in use, though I couldn't graph it for you.

[thistleingrey]

Thought-provoking post! I think of art as primarily aesthetic (pretty) and craft as primarily pragmatic; naturally, they can and do overlap, but craft to me isn't a denigration of an object or the skills required to make it.

I suspect that the "reclaim ___" thing is partly why Maker Faire uses a third word entirely. :)

[indeliblesasha]

Do not forget that "(arts &) crafts" are also the remarkably ugly noodle painted ashtray picture frame paintings that kindergartners bring home for their parents to love and adore and keep forever and attempt embarrass you with the first time you bring your (beautifully artistic) husband home for Christmas.

And "crafts" are also one of a kind amazingly horrific paisley printed lace festooned glitter painted glue gun and cardboard photo album nightmares that your great-grandmother created in her "craft room" JUST FOR YOU.

I for one, do. not. make. crafts. And it has absolutely nothing to do with sexism, or artistic merit, or values of craftsmanship. If my family were to ever declare anything I do as "crafts" or "crafty" I might actually CRY. :D

(ETA: Which is not to say that I don't love and adore the lace festooned wonders. I do, because they were made with so much love. But they are SO UGLY OMG. :D )

But then I also do not and have not ever thought of my knitting and sewing and woodwork in terms of art or crafts. It's for function and it's fun and if it's pretty at the same time that's even better.

But if someone says to me "lets do crafts!" I'm picturing glitter and hot glue guns, which are totally fun! But do not invoke a great sense of "art" in me. And I don't even put knitting on the list of things to do when you're "doing crafts."

If someone says "I do woodworking" I do not think of their work as "crafts" even though I will think of their skill in terms of "craftsmanship."

If someone says "I'm a craftsman" I go straight to "What do you make?" and would not be surprised to hear knitted items, or wood crafted items, or I dunno...shoes? Jewelry, what have you.

I think it's just yet another word in the English language that is SO laden with different meaning and intention and history that it's not necessarily the best option to use in a lot of cases.

[hyperbole]

I haven't given much thought to the issue (although it's definitely interesting!) but for me, "a work of art" is unique and cannot be reproduced with the same outcome (kind of like a failed chemistry (science-in-general...) experiment), while something "crafted" can be done again and again by many different people with approximately the same result. Of course there are many things that can't be redone exactly the same way that aren't art and probably lots of items that are clearly art that can actually be made just-so again.

I personally prefer "craft" to "art" because art seems to have to be useless. I can't fathom making or buying something just because it's pretty if it doesn't also fill a function (and no, looking pretty isn't function enough - I have tried!). As a knitter I really struggle to find something I want to both make (because it's pretty) and use (because it's useful and unannoying) - I love the look of shawls and knitting lace in general, but I just am not a shawl person and I can only justify having so many shawls at the bottom of my wardrobe.