 June 2008
Greetings!
The Center for Craft, Creativity and Design (CCCD) has launched ENEWS to keep you current with all our programs, exhibits and events. ENEWS will be sent out monthly with most news linking to more lengthy information found on our website www.craftcreativitydesign.org. Announcements cards will still be mailed for upcoming exhibits and talks. If you are on our mailing list to receive an announcement card for exhibits and would prefer to receive the information through ENEWS, please let us know and it will save us a stamp! Dian Magie, Executive Director EXHIBITIONS
May 20 - August 22, 2008
The Center for Craft, Creativity & Design’s current exhibit, “Inspired Design: Jacquard & Entrepreneurial Textiles,” consists of both national and international leading artists of innovative textile design, including a variety of computer designed textile applications. These artists/designer/artisans bring together both the artistic talent and a scientific frame of mind to create their work. Textile design is a specialized field that involves several sectors - fashion, interior decoration, the production of expressive works, sculptures, and hand-crafted items. It overlaps the fields of art, crafts and design, therefore bridging areas that often seek to separate themselves from one another. This exhibit features designs and work that represent five 21st Century design growth areas of creative/innovative textiles and digital technologies.
*Names with asterisks are speakers at the January 7-10, 2009 Conference in Hendersonville, North Carolina presented by the Center for Craft, Creativity and Design and held at the Bo Thomas Auditorium, Blue Ridge Community College. INSPIRED DESIGN CONFERENCE
The conference schedule with keynote speakers, in addition to the speakers asterisked above, can be found with a registration form at www.craftcreativitydesign.org/education/textiledesign or contact CCCD at 828-890-2050 to have a registration form mailed to you. Student Assistants Announced Many students applied for the student assistant positions with the January 2009 INSPIRED DESIGN Conference. The selection process was made especially difficult due to the highly qualified applicants. In return for assisting with on-site registration and conference logistics, students receive free registration and lodging for four nights. The following students and alternates have been selected to assist with the conference:
Alternatives In the event selected students are not able to participate the following students have been selected as alternates.
Also assisting with the conference, will be Windgate Fellowship recipients working in fiber, both attending the graduate fiber program at Virginia Commonwealth University in fall 2008, 2006 Windgate Fellow, Aaron McIntosh, BFA Fiber graduate of Appalachian Center for the Crafts, and 2007 Windgate Fellow, Andrea Donnelly, BFA Textile Design graduate of North Carolina State University. For more information and to view work of the Windgate Fellows, a program administered by CCCD, see www.craftcreativitydesign.org/research/windgate. 2008 CRAFT RESEARCH FUND GRANTS
Guidelines and applications are now available online at www.craftcreativitydesign.org for the 2008 Craft Research Fund, awarding PROJECT GRANTS of up to $15,000 for research in United States craft by academics, independent scholars, and curators and GRADUATE RESEARCH GRANTS of up to $10,000 to graduate students currently enrolled in a graduate program in an accredited college or university for research related to a thesis or dissertation on United States craft. This is a national award program in its fourth year, administered by the Center for Craft, Creativity and Design. DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS FOR THE 2008 GRANTS IN BOTH CATEGORIES IS JULY 1, 2008, with announcement of awards by mid-September 2008 for research beginning October 1, 2008 to be completed within 18 months. 2008 NORTH CAROLINA THINK-TANK
The 2008 North Carolina Craft Think-Tank marked the seventh year CCCD has convened leaders in the field of craft. The number is limited to no more than 24 participants to allow for a meaningful dialogue on each of the topics. Topics discussed are introduced by participants then opened to the full group for discussion. Initiatives identified in past retreats have led to project and programs for both CCCD and institutions throughout the country. The 2008 session major points were recorded by CCCD director Dian Magie and assistant director Katie Lee and outlined in this report. The event begins on Thursday with an optional tour that changes each year. The 2008 tour included: a) visit to the future site of the UNC Asheville Craft Campus, located adjacent to the closed Buncombe County landfill, as a demonstration of energy alternatives and green building; b) Energy Xchange, a residency program on a landfill north of Asheville that uses methane to fire glass furnaces and clay kilns; c) Penland School of Crafts. Thursday evening participants gather to meet at the opening dinner held in the CCCD gallery. Friday and Saturday are spent in discussions outlined in the report. The Think-Tank closes with a reception and dinner, held in 2008 at the Blue Spiral I gallery in Asheville. CCCD books all rooms of a downtown Hendersonville Inn for participants, providing one-on-one networking and social gatherings. A number of research projects and publications can be traced to sidebars that took place at breakfast or on the Inn's veranda. The seventh annual North Carolina Think-Tank, convened by the Center for Craft, Creativity and Design, was held April 3-5, 2008. This annual Think-Tank began in 2002 to bring together 18-22 leading authors, curators, academics and artists to discuss how craft can be advanced in academia and the curatorial world, from throughout the U.S. with representation from craft programs in other countries. Think-Tank participants discuss major issues of the craft field over two days. CCCD makes every effort to balance the participants geographically, by subject and discipline, and role in the craft world. Readings relevant to the topics are sent in packets to each participant prior to the two-day meeting. In 2008 each participant received the first issue of the peer reviewed journal, The Journal of Modern Craft. One to three participants are asked to lead discussions on each topic, then open the discussion to the full group. The report on the 2008 Think-Tank discussions, as well as previous Think-Tanks, can be found at www.craftcreativitydesign.org/research/reports.php. 2008 Think-Tank participants
Joining the Friday afternoon discussion, the following Windgate Fellowship recipients: Ben Johnson, 2006 graduate Kent State, BFA in Glass PUBLICATIONS
Thinking Through Craft is co-published in association with the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Written by Glenn Adamson, Deputy Head of Research and Head of Graduate Studies at the Victoria and Albert Museum, "this book is a timely and engaging introduction to the way that artists working in all media think about craft. Workmanship is key to today's visual arts, when high 'production values' are becoming increasingly commonplace. Yet craft's centrality to contemporary art has received little serious attention from critics and historians. Dispensing with clichéd arguments that craft is art, Adamson persuasively makes a case for defining craft in a more nuanced fashion. The interesting thing about craft, he argues, is that it is perceived to be 'inferior' to art. The book consists of an overview of various aspects of this second-class identity - supplementarity, sensuality, skill, the pastoral, and the amateur. It also provides historical case studies analyzing craft's role in a variety of disciplines, including architecture, design, contemporary art, and the crafts themselves." Source: www.amazon.com Ornament as art: Avant-Garde Jewelry from the Helen Williams Drutt Collection This richly illustrated 528-page catalogue, available at amazon.com, features an introduction and essay by Cindi Strauss, an essay by Helen Williams Drutt English, an interview of Drutt by Strauss, a chronology of major events in contemporary jewelry, a complete illustrated checklist of the Drutt collection and artist biographies. This catalogue accompanies a landmark exhibition that explores contemporary jewelry from a global perspective. The exhibition traces the development of artist-made jewelry and honors its craft roots while also placing the work within a larger framework of seminal movements in 20th century art. Ornament as Art showcases a broad array of national and international works made between 1963 and 2006. The exhibition includes 300 objects, including 275 pieces of jewelry and drawings, watercolors, sketchbooks and sculptural constructions by the artists. Cindi Strauss, curator of modern and contemporary decorative arts and design at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, organized the exhibition; Robyn Kennedy, chief of the Renwick Gallery, is coordinating curator for the exhibition in Washington. Makers: 20th Century American Studio Craft (working title) At the first "Think-Tank" convened by CCCD in 2002, of craft faculty, museum director and curators, scholars and critics, the initiative ranked as most important to the advancement of the field was a history of American Craft in the twentieth Century. The journey toward making this a reality can be tracked on www.craftcreativitydesign.org/research/history.php. 20th Century American Studio Craft by Janet Koplos and Bruce Metcalf is with the publisher, the University of North Carolina Press. Long awaited, the book, researched and written under the auspices of CCCD, will include 500+ images and also serve as an undergraduate text. It will be released in late 2008. The University of North Carolina Press is making craft history and criticism a focus of the Press. Cahiers métiers d'art* Craft Journal, is a nonprofit organization that encourages and publishes critical, historical and technical research on local and international craft. Membership includes a subscription to the Cahiers métiers d'art* Craft Journal published twice a year. Each issue presents essays from international researchers in both French and English; book and exhibition reviews; and profiles of craftspeople from around the world. (www.craftjournal.ca) Denis Longchamps, publisher and managing editor, is interested in critical, technical and historical research on craft from all regions of the world. The first issue of The Journal of Modern Craft, edited by Glenn Adamson, Victoria & Albert Museum, UK; Edward S. Cooke, Jr. Yale University, USA; Tanya Harrod, Royal College of Art, UK, is the first peer-reviewed academic journal to provide an interdisciplinary and international forum in its subject area. It address all forms of making that self-consciously set themselves apart from mass production - whether in the making of designed objects, artworks, buildings or other artefacts. Published three times a year in March, July and November. To place an order/subscription visit www.bergpublishers.com and download order forms or email custerserv@turpin-distribution.com. About Us
The Center for Craft, Creativity and Design is an inter-institutional Center of the University of North Carolina. The mission of the regional UNC Center is to support and advance craft, creativity and design in education and research, and, through community collaborations, to demonstrate ways that craft and design provide creative solutions to community issues. The mission of the nonprofit CCCD is to support the mission of the UNC center through funding, programs, and outreach to artists, craft organizations, schools in the community, region and nation. email: info@craftcreativitydesign.org |
