Summary This article aims to interrogate Japanese theorist Sōetsu Yanagi’s philosophical writings on Zen Buddhism and Zen aesthetics (as expounded in his essays published in The unknown craftsman: a Japanese insight into beauty), as well as the being-historical writing of Martin Heidegger as encountered in his publication Mindfulness, in order to point out the similarities in thought expressed in these two publications with regard to the way in which the ordinary affords access to the extraordinary. In this way Heidegger’s terms ‘be-ing’ and ‘being’ are related to Yanagi’s framework of the relationship between ‘wabi’ and ‘shibui’. In the process Heidegger’s thought is hermeneutically interpreted in terms of Yanagi’s explication of the Zen notion of non-dualist beauty.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1984. / Typescript. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 83-95).

"The idea and fact of containment have been the primary significance of pottery from the beginning, and pots of all ages and peoples, even when their ostensible function was ceremonial or symbolical, have expressed by their generous swelling volumes, the potential or holding things of vital importance to man food, liquid or the furnishings of the grave." The utilitarian value of a pot is inseparable from its aesthetic quality. "There can be no fullness of complete realization or utility without beauty, refinement and charm, for the simple reason that their absence must in the long run be intolerable to both maker and consumer... The continued production of utilities without delight in making and using is bound to produce only boredom and to end in sterility." Modern pottery, whether industrial or that of the artist potter, has each in its different way tended to separate the aesthetic and the utilitarian. This is one symptom of the cultural decline of our Western tradition since the Eighteenth Century. The making of pots has persisted from earliest times to the present day through our ever changing world. Circumstances have at times obscured the essential truths of this art.

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This narrative research examines the ways in which craft is conceptualized from the perspective of five recent graduates from the Material Art and Design Fibre Program at a prominent Canadian art and design university. Recognizing the cultural currents that have excised acts of making, including Western de-industrialization and abundant access to offshore labour markets, this research looks at the role of maker within a new societal context. A nascent theoretical platform for craft, shaped by artists and academics, counters a dearth of voices that has characterized the field’s history. Here, craft is posited as a methodology, characterized by embodiment, subjectivity, resistance, and skill. The experience of emerging makers, and their reflection in relation to this theoretical framework, allows for a broader consideration of present-day craft practice, and a renewed consideration of material arts curricula.

This narrative research examines the ways in which craft is conceptualized from the perspective of five recent graduates from the Material Art and Design Fibre Program at a prominent Canadian art and design university. Recognizing the cultural currents that have excised acts of making, including Western de-industrialization and abundant access to offshore labour markets, this research looks at the role of maker within a new societal context. A nascent theoretical platform for craft, shaped by artists and academics, counters a dearth of voices that has characterized the field’s history. Here, craft is posited as a methodology, characterized by embodiment, subjectivity, resistance, and skill. The experience of emerging makers, and their reflection in relation to this theoretical framework, allows for a broader consideration of present-day craft practice, and a renewed consideration of material arts curricula.

To gain the title of master is not an easy feat 1. Learning a particular craft takes time, attention and dedication. Recently, this type of commitment has become old fashioned, even burdensome. New commitments to production and efficiency have forced the American craftsmen and builders to change theirs as well. This shift has in many ways removed the thinking from making 2. It has removed the joy of labor and craft, in effect removing the dignity and pride of work 3. Current architectural discourse has emphasized and promoted personal value and self-worth through the buildings we build. However, the promotion of this ethical stance has gone largely unnoticed towards the builders of the American built environment. By placing the tool back into the craftsman's hands and teaching him how to think he begins to more fully know himself and know his work. He becomes dignified through his craft. The employment of these skilled craftsmen raises the standards of building. The architect can be more reliant on the skill of the craftsman while the craftsman can be more assured of employment. One ceases to be above the other but both, with complementary skills, are able to achieve the full realization of their work through the other. / 0 / SPK / specialcollections@tulane.edu

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I'll make a big, yellow tapestry. In the project I'll examine textures and surfaces in a monumental tapestry, and the translation of an image into a tapestry through reliefs and materials. I'm a tapestry weaver, and in this project I'll work with structures and the sculptural aspect of weaving in an abstract tapestry. My aim for my textiles in general is to give the viewer a sublime feeling when they meet my work. In an extended scene this is a textile version of a photography. When I look at something for a long amount of time, it'll turn into structures, then the image itself is not so important anymore but the memory of it. This is a tapestry where I have turned this memories into structures in textile material. This project is a research in many various woven structures and techniques, which is arranged intuitively. It doesn't have a specific message but to re-create the sense of many and complex feelings. The different structures portrays the process of memories, like solitude, fears, tenderness, abstraction/imagination and concrete reality. This tapestry is the result of many experiments with the form and structure.

This is a study at the interface of self, craft, and sustainability. It is a small part of a wider personal and social conjecture on the subject of ‘change ’ involving these three domains.This research develops the proposal that the success of a profound social change, which in our time pertains to the change towards sustainable societies, lies in the likeliness of self-transformation in individuals. Here the craft perspective is taken in order to link it to a large body of research in response to environmental and ethical concerns. However, unlike other object-oriented approaches with a similar purpose, the purpose of this research is to seek a greater contribution from craft practice when it is viewed as a transformation of the craftsperson. By referring to this human capacity, it argues, not only is crafting an inducement to self-transformation but also self-transformation can be regarded as a craft. To support this argument, material is drawn from the literature on craft, sustainability, philosophy of the self and social and developmental psychology. The historical and developmental formations of the key areas of the research are explored and psychological factors that motivate desirable ‘changes’ are identified. This exploration is then supported by interviews, personal narratives and the active participation of the researcher in the actual practice of craft. The research suggests that the state of self-actualization, where humanity reaches its fullness, is the destination to which the self needs to transform. It then traces elements involved in such a transformation back to their origin. This includes meanings and values leading to transformation, knowledge leading to meanings, experience leading to knowledge and the embodied connection between the self and the environment leading to experience. At the deepest level, it proposes a particular mode of relationship which is best described as craftsmanship or ‘the craft way of being.’ This process is also traced in the personal experience of the researcher.This thesis concludes with an explanation of the concept of ‘deep craft’. It proposes that the outcome of a deeper understanding of craft, which in effect widens the territory of craft activities, becomes manifest in the world in the form of ‘care taking’, essential for the ‘change’ towards more sustainable societies.