craft thinkin (am I wading into a nasty swamp here?)

Craft is an odd thing. Society isn't sure where it's placed or how to think about it. For example: I was talking to a gallery owner about maybe organising a craft exhibition a few years ago and she was behind the idea but said several times through out the conversation "Now, you'll make sure it's high craft, wont you. I don't really want low craft in it. Only really good craft." And I assured her the craft would all be of the highest quality, but secretly inside I was wondering where the line is drawn.

It was actually the first time I'd heard the term "high craft" and "low craft". I come from a fine arts background, so I've heard of High Art, but you don't hear much of Low Art. There is Lowbrow Art, but that's different again. High Art is really Fine Art, the upper end of the scale in quality and subject matter. Lowbrow art is on the other end of the subject matter scale, stuff that's snigger worthy. Of course, there are people that transcend this, Jeff Koons leaps to mind as a man who makes High Art out of lowbrow subject matter.

But to High Craft and Low Craft... When she said it, I quietly went home and did some research on the net, and spent a lot of time thinking about it after that. It seems on the net that the popular opinion is that older crafters see older crafter's work as High Craft and the new wave of indy crafters as Low Craft. There are arguments out there that if it doesn't come out of a university degree, it aint High. The problem with researching it on the net is that the arguments are all one sided. The older guys who seem to be fighting off the indy crowd don't really blog, and so it's the indy crowd telling everyone their version of what the other side thinks.

Not really the best way to understand the argument, and it turns out, not really the argument I'm looking for.

What I'm trying to find is the definition of what is High Craft and what is Low Craft. And thus, in finding that maybe I can find the reason why it's important. I understand that the gallery owner didn't want crap in her gallery, only quality craft. But it seemed to me she was asking more than that.

Who is to say what's not gallery-worthy? I've seen some dreadful things in galleries over the years, often under the label of Fine art. Who says that all crafters make things for galleries? A number I know make things for the joy of it, make things to put in shops and would never think of putting their stuff in a gallery. But who is to say that craft does not belong in a gallery? Walking past Craft Victoria's shop front on Little Flinders you can always see the craft through the window. Craft Victoria only deals with High Craft, and crafters who do it full time, they're not interested in people who craft for a hobby (direct quote from a friend of mine who was told that by CV). But surely that's not where the line is drawn.

I come up against pregidous with my craft. Art dolls have secured their place in the art community, there are some truly exquisite dolls out there (and again I point you to Beth Robinson as an example) but it's hard to find exquisitely beautiful knitted dolls. Knitting, from its very nature, is chunky, and chunky dolls end up being cute.

So that makes me wonder if I knitted a doll with tiny needles and 2 ply wool, would she still end up being cute? The same gallery owner who didn't want Low Craft kept asking me "So, when are we going to see an exhibition of your knitted monsters?" That never helped my ability to find the line between high and low craft. Monsters were high craft enough for her?

It's a strange concept, and one I'm still wrestling with. I don't have any answers at this stage, I"m still jsut kicking around concepts.

As for craft itself, I'm not really interested in the scrap booking, primitive kind of craft that stores like Lincraft seem to be geared towards, although it's usually the subject matter rather than the style. Painting a set of drawers in various shades of pink or scrapbooking images of cats doesn't really inspire and excite me. Anything with googily eyes makes me wary. Children making that stuff, that's fine. But when you find adults making it, that makes me wonder why they never progressed. But then, it's unfair to judge crafts that people make for themselves against my higher standard of craft of a quality to sell or exhibit. Maybe that's, at least in part, where a line should be drawn. The purpose of the craft has to be taken into account when deciding where on the line it goes.

But whatever conclusions I finally come to, I'm beginning to find that in every group in society there are a) people who look down and up at everybody else and b) sub groups of same. So in craft there are people fighting a war to find where on the hierarchy they are placed, and at the same time, identifying themselves with smaller sub-groups, and doing the same there. I first noticed this mentality in the goth community. Yes, I know its hard to believe, but I was once young and angsty too, and you'd walk into a room of other goths (usually at a club) and everyone there would instantly measure you against their mental Goth Ladder to find where you were placed, and, more importantly, where you were placed in reference to them. It was also called the Gother Than Thou mentality, and as I recall, there was a card game and everything.

So, to sum up.
- There is High Craft and Low Craft, although I don't know where the line is or really what checkpoints to use when assessing something
- There is a rift between the old guard of seemingly academically educated older crafters and the hip new indy guys
- There seems to be a Crafter Than Thou attitude from some crafters, although this is pretty much across the board of humanity in everything people do
- and for people who take themselves so seriously, goths are pretty damn funny