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May 05, 2006
The Arts and The Crafts
Over on My Dad’s a communist, Daphne asks: “what's the difference between art and craft?”
It’s a loaded question - there’s a lot of rivalry betwixt the arts and the crafts movements, craftsmen wanting to aspire to the Arts and artists not wanting to be thought of as mere craftsmen. And it’s all the fault of Joshua Reynolds.
Sir Joshua Reynolds, Self-portrait when Young, courtesy of the Tate collection
Artist comes from the word Artisan, meaning a skilled person working with his [or her] hands, which is a good description of a craftsman, and is what artists used to do, until Conceptual Art dawned and Artists started working with their minds - not a good day for the Arts Movement perhaps.
In 1768, due some artistic infighting between two architects [Sir William Chambers and James Paine being the main protagonists], the Royal Academy was founded. The first president was one Sir Joshua Reynolds. He was hell-bent on raising the role of artist from artisan to intellectual. So he plucked the humble artisan from the high street, where he was minding his own business painting portraits and religious iconography for whichsoever wealthy patron popped into his shop – his workshop that is, and placed him in a garret [and let him starve].
Starving is obviously an envious position for, from this point, craftsmen [and craftswomen] everywhere wanted to ascend the steep stairway to the garret and there to starve, as an Artist.
Posted by john at May 5, 2006 04:51 PM