Arts N' Crafts

I am an artist. I am also a craftsman. I am currently unsure if there’s a distinction. Intellectually, I know that there is. As succinctly as I can put it, a craft is functional art. If it serves a utilitarian purpose, it’s a craft; if it serves an exclusively aesthetic purpose, it is art. And, as art, it commands a much higher dollar value than a craft.

I’m very torn as to whether I buy into this dogma. By essay’s end, I will have both defended and picked apart this logic. And I can almost guarantee I will not come to any sort of conclusion, infuriating myself and and any readers who were (naively) banking in my wisdom to resolve the matter.

The human animal has a funny little quirk among animals of valuing luxuries over neccessities. It obviously comes from a time when we were settling into cognitive thought and first started appreciating things for their appearance. We still knew that we needed things, and we knew what those things were (tools, clothing, shelter, food), but now there were suddenly these things we wanted for no other reason than they looked good. They didn’t help us live, they made living more enjoyable. I’ll fight the urge to go on an anthropological tangent and merely note that over time, labor became specialized, and an artisan class emerged, and with each generation, these craftspeople became better at making the things we needed, to the point where aesthetic decisions were coming into play.

Fast forward 13,000 years. I can sell an etching for $275, but a book I hand stitch, using a less successful pull of that same etching as a cover, I can charge $45. Tops.

The book is far more useful, so why not charge more? I think I have the answer: First off, the etching is pure art. I am implicitly saying when I market this etching, “This is the best I have to offer. It is a culmination of years of practice & education, and a fine demostration of all my artistic abilities. I offer this etching up to history, in the hopes that future generations (as well as this) will appreciate it for the miracle that it is.”

It’s not as hyperbolic as it sounds. We artists must have a firm belief in our abilities to even want to present our art to the world. I also think it hits upon the crux of the matter: Art is an investment. A craft, no matter how beautifully made, is intended to be used. And things that get used tend to get broken, weathered, beaten & torn. So, to our subconscious, the craftsperson is saying, “I present to you this, the best of my hand. I thing it’s really good, but not so great that you should put it away forever in a safe place. Go ahead, break it! I can always make another...”

Yes, I know how wrong this is. The craftsperson is no less talented, their work no less amazing than an artist. Proof? take a mid-nineteenth century quilt, put it on the wall, and 150 years later that craft becomes art. Take a (and yes, allow me the lattitue to paraphrase Indiana Jones here) crudely flaked stone, bury it for 13,000 years, dig it up, and put it in a museum. I’d stand in line to see that before 99.99% of all the work of all the artists of the last 500 years.

Once again, time is the great equalizer. So, craftsmen take heart, we artists won’t make any money until we’re dead, and even then, only if we’re very, very good. But, not only will you make money in your lifetime, but if by some fluke your work manages to survive a few centuries intact, it’ll BECOME art.

Not that it wasn’t before, but, well, y’know...