News from Rosy Greenlees
*NEW CRAFTS COUNCIL PROGRAMMES*
It seems only a few weeks since I was looking back at Collect and contemplating a busy summer of exhibitions around the country and online in my last update. But now it is inescapably autumn, and the next few months will be very busy indeed with the launch of new initiatives in professional development for makers, new participation and learning projects and the start of our new research programme. Details of all of these will be posted on our website over the coming months, so log on regularly and sign up for information at www.craftscouncil.org.uk.
Meanwhile, this e-bulletin highlights three important Crafts Council projects:
Hand Built: the Crafts Council at the London Design Festival
Our current Crafts Council/V&A maker-in-residence Mary Butcher
and Origin
As both Hand Built and Mary Butcher are based in the V&A’s Sackler Centre for arts education, do take the chance to see two of the ways in which we are enabling people to learn more about contemporary craft at the same time.
Collect 2010
Looking much further ahead, I am delighted to confirm dates for Collect 2010 at the Saatchi Gallery in London from 14-17 May 2010 following the £1M worth of sales at Collect 2009. Tickets will go on sale early in the New Year, but Save the Date now! Potential exhibitors should note that the deadline for applications is 19 October 2009. Find out more
ANNOUNCEMENTS, REVIEWS AND CONSULTATIONS
There were a surprising number of announcements, reviews and consultations over the summer. We post information on our website as soon as we receive it, but I am taking the opportunity to highlight some important recent items here.
REVIEWS
Primary Curriculum Review
A proposed new primary curriculum has recently been announced by the Qualifications and Curriculum Development Agency (formerly the QCA). We broadly welcome its content, which has the scope to offer children a much richer experience of craft than the current curriculum and which effectively reflects the recommendations of Sir Jim Rose’s review, commissioned by the Secretary of State, which preceded it. Click here for our full response including our specific comments and our concerns regarding some elements of detail.
Creative & Cultural Skills national occupational standards consultation
Creative & Cultural Skills is seeking views on the proposed National Occupational Standards for Craft, one of the actions arising from the Craft Blueprint which we developed in partnership and launched earlier this year.
National Occupational Standards are intended to inform training and qualifications, providing a clear description of what people need to know and do to perform jobs successfully. Creative & Cultural Skills has identified some activities which the Standards for Craft could cover and would like your views.
To take part in their online questionnaire please visit the online survey.
NEW OPPORTUNITIES FOR CRAFTS
Pop-Up Shops
Following our note about Government support for pop-up shops in June, further information has been announced as to how the £3 million funding will be allocated. Follow this link to see how to apply – funds are available to individuals, so we hope that makers will be high amongst the beneficiaries.
Learn more
Government’s Building Schools for the Future Programme
There is a new opportunity for interested craft organisations to work collaboratively in the built environment. It is now a requirement that every local authority sets up a Cultural Stakeholder Group to champion the arts, culture and cultural learning within its Building Schools for the Future programme, and for this group to be informed by arts organisations. We encourage regional and local craft organisations to contact their local authority arts officer with a view to championing craft within this group.
Learn more
IDeA
If you look to local government for funding or support, you should read Investing in Creative Industries? – the new report from IDeA, the improvement and development agency for local government. This guide for local authorities offers advice aimed at helping local authorities decide whether to support the creative industries in their area and to consider what forms of investment might be effective. It is generally positive about the benefits the creative industries can bring, from jobs to place-shaping, but it does include some caveats that anyone negotiating with a local authority should be aware of. Read guide
WORLD CRAFTS COUNCIL UK
In July, I attended the World Crafts Council’s UK Committee meeting, hosted by Devon Guild of Craftsmen, where we discussed the forthcoming annual WCC Europe meeting and nominations for the Board.
There were reports on the WCC meeting held at Collect where European members were invited to debate the issues facing craft in their own countries and on the European Applied Arts Prize organised by WCC-BF in Belgium and covered in my last update.
Find out more about the prize
Find out more about the World Crafts Council and WCC UK
OUT AND ABOUT
In addition to attending the World Crafts Council meeting, I had a very interesting trip to the Irish Republic hosted by the Irish Crafts Council. Two days of visits to makers and galleries and the opportunity to talk at length with Irish Crafts Council staff was immensely useful – as was the discovery of the extent of the similarities between issues in Ireland and in the UK.
I also attended the Creative & Cultural Skills board meeting, Arts Council England’s Turning Point Group Networks meeting and the most recent ERA 21 meeting and met with David Kester, Chief Executive of the Design Council. Colleagues visited 60/40’s installation Notes for a Future Work at Siobhan Davies Studios, Creation II at Goldsmiths and Arts Council England’s Forming Ideas conference and AmbITion seminars. As usual, we have also visited most of the current graduate shows including, of course, New Designers.
IN THE NEWS
“PRODUCTS WITH SOUL”
Following reports of the current spending boom in museum and heritage shops, which tended to typify purchases as “plastic dinosaurs and tea-towels” we responded to remind readers that craft presents a very different “cultural offer” which offers long-term pleasure to its owners. The Guardian identified buyers’ delight in “products with soul” – there could be no better definition of craft.
We will be commissioning research on the current extent of consumer desire for value-centred products, services and experiences later in the year. Meanwhile, our new Take Stock bursaries are aimed at helping retailers make the most of the work they sell. The successful recipients of the first round of Take Stock bursaries will be announced in October.
And, of course, you can come and meet nearly 300 makers and their soul-full products at Origin!
CRAFT ON THE PLINTH
Congratulations to Deirdre Figueiredo who took to the Fourth Plinth at 8pm on a rainy Friday 17 July. Deirdre looked magnificent in Kei Ito and spent the time getting to grips with her knitting. Read more
If you have been on the Fourth Plinth, or know any makers or other craft professionals who have, let us know at media@craftscouncil.org.uk
CROCHETED LIONS
Following the success of our own Hyperbolic Crochet participation project, I was delighted to see crocheted lions are on the short-list for Artists Taking the Lead. Of course, craft features in other projects throughout the shortlist – and I have long argued that it permeates the visual arts in ways which are imperfectly acknowledged and understood – but this Olympiad proposal certainly flies the flag.
TASTING SPOONS: THE CRAFTS MAGAZINE BLOG
If Craft on the Plinth (above) was your introduction to our Crafts magazine blogs, these might whet your appetite even more…
The new magazine section is already the second most popular area of our website – and web visits overall continue to rise with 34,000 visits in June 2009, compared with 22,000 in June 2008. Follow the links for the UK’s most comprehensive online craft resource.
CRAFTS COUNCIL IN THE NEWS
Continuing its recent focus on craft, Arts Industry followed its excellent profile of Cockpit’s Vanessa Swan with an opportunity for me to focus on skills development following the launch of the Craft Blueprint.
And we were delighted that our touring exhibition Wood (in partnership with TEN) was the highlighted feature on the Guardian’s homepage and that Museums Journal has featured Out of the Ordinary: Spectacular Craft and the new acquisitions for the Crafts Council Collection in its two most recent issues.
Extract from Arts Industry Profile: Rosy Greenlees
Wood in The Guardian’s Gallery
See you at Origin!
Rosy Greenlees
Executive Director
04 September 2009
