Updates from Rosy Greenlees
April 2011
Spring is always a busy time at the Crafts Council and this year has been no exception. In addition to a full programme, we have been following the unfolding effects of changes to public funding on craft organisations – initially the impact of changes in local authority funding and now the potential consequences of the change to Arts Council England’s portfolio of organisations receiving funding. I will return to this at the end of this bulletin, but first, an update on our recent activities.
CraftNet
Following its postponement owing to December’s icy blasts, it was really good to join forty delegates at the National Glass Centre for our joint seminar on sustainability organised and chaired by CraftNet member Izzy McDonald-Booth, the NGC’s curator and buyer of craft and design. A series of engaging speakers included Matt Durran who spoke about recent projects including his recycling of glass TV screens, Catherine Bertola discussing her site-specific installations using dust and Cathy Newbery speaking about her upcycling project in Cockermouth.
More recently, we co-presented Planning the Town of Craft with the Craft Study Centre in Farnham. A panel including CraftNet member Professor Simon Olding, Director of the Craft Study Centre, Gavin Stride, Director of Farnham Maltings, textile artist Alice Kettle and Ruth Potts, co-author of the New Economic Foundation report Re-imagining the high street: Escape from Clone Town Britain discussed the importance of ‘a sense of place’ to local economies and the potential role of craft in town planning in a thought-provoking afternoon. We will be incorporating material from the afternoon into our next briefing note on craft’s role in rural and market town economies (see below).
Crafts Council Briefing Notes
We will be issuing a series of online briefing notes on a range of subjects this year.
The first note, on Sustainability, was published to coincide with the seminar at the National Glass Centre. The second, an exploration of craft’s role in happiness and well-being to coincide with the current government consultation on attitudes to well-being is live now– please do have your say before the government consultation closes and we will return to the subject thereafter.
Following this, we plan to publish a note examining the role of craft in rural communities and market towns, including related themes from the CraftNet event in Farnham.
Read Craft & Environmental Sustainability here and Craft and Well-being here.
We welcome your comments at research@craftscouncil.org.uk
Education
At Assemble 2010, our sector conference last June, delegates told us that their most important priorities for the sector were ensuring that craft is properly funded and taught by professionals in our schools and colleges; that craft is properly recognised and valued in secondary schools and that it is perceived as a professional occupation by the public. We agree and believe that there is a dual need: to encourage the makers, audiences and, indeed, collectors of the future, but also to ensure that young people’s haptic skills are developed and that there are opportunities to experience making skills in schools.
Government initiatives have resulted in a lot of activity at all levels of the education system in the last few months with the publication of the Schools White Paper and the Henley Review of Music Education from the Department for Education and the news that the latter has now also committed to a further review by Darren Henley examining cultural education more broadly.
In addition, the Department for Business Innovation and Skills is soon to publish a Higher Education White Paper and there have been a number of Select Committee consultations including the Education Select Committee inquiry into the English Baccalaureate, the Business, Innovation and Skills Select Committee inquiry into the future of Higher Education and the current DfE review of the National Curriculum.
Alongside our active participation and learning programmes, we continue to respond to White Papers and submit evidence to Select Committees on this and many other subjects –if you want more detail, do subscribe to our monthly policy briefing for updates. In the mean-time we are currently running a survey to ensure that we continue to deliver programmes that meet current needs and priorities in education and overcome some of the increasing constraints on schools and education professionals. If you work in an education context, access the survey here.
Craft, Arts & Science
A piece in Psychology Today a few weeks ago attracted much comment. Researchers Michele and Robert Root-Bernstein quoted the Chief Executives of Boeing, Eli Lilly, United Technologies and the Bayer Corporation, all speaking in support of the contribution that the arts make to innovation in science and industry in an article that updated their 2009 article Arts & Crafts: Keys to Scientific Creativity. The recent piece was picked up around the world and echoes UK research by the Crafts Council and others.
As with recent comments by John Maeda in The Guardian that “Stem” subjects (science, technology, engineering and maths) should be widened to include art; “turning Stem into Steam, the sense of recognition is palpable. We know we’re right – but it’s nice to be in good company.
The Digital World
Of course, we will only engage young people if we speak their language and use the right media. And recent months have presented us with new opportunities: Our exhibition Lab Craft: digital adventures in contemporary craft continues to tour and is now showing at the New Brewery Arts Centre in Cirencester until 25 April. Our especially-commissioned Breath Taking exhibition films are available on YouTube , we now have over 5,000 (and rising) followers on Twitter (@CraftsCouncilUK) and continue to gather Facebook fans daily.
And we joined organisations including the BBC, The Guardian, Royal Opera House, Watershed and the Culture Grid, amongst others, at the first ever (as far as we know) Culture Hack Day where digital makers showed how we could re-present our information to make it exciting and accessible to digital consumers. Expect more anon, starting with the first Crafts Council “app” launching for smartphones in time for COLLECT 2011.
Mapping and Impact Study
In a perhaps more sedate – but very important – reference to research, I would like to take the opportunity to remind you about our major forthcoming study to map the size and impact of the contemporary craft sector across the UK in partnership with Creative Scotland, Arts Council Wales and CraftNI, making it the largest single piece of research we have conducted since 2004’s Making it in the 21st century and marking the first time that all four nations have surveyed the crafts sector simultaneously. Please get involved – register with admin@bop.co.uk for the telephone survey and forward this information to your professional craft colleagues
Out and about
Released after “the weather”, it was good to get out of the office and visit makers, museums and galleries in many cities including York to visit York Museums Trust and the School House Gallery, Plymouth for an event during Lab Craft’s showing at Plymouth College of Art and Design and to meet members of staff there, Wolverhampton University to visit the School of Art and Design and Bilston Craft Gallery for the launch of Breath Taking and finally to Cirencester to visit New Brewery Arts Centre for the opening of Lab Craft.
Closer to home, we participated in a sold-out event presented by Stylist magazine aimed at women who want to set up their own craft business. A packed audience of 250 listened to a panel including Donna Wilson talk about the joys and challenges of running a business followed by the opportunity to talk on a one to one basis with the Crafts Council and other organisations. Another confirmation that the appetite to learn more about craft is huge – and growing.
It was a delight to visit Goldsmith’s new exhibition of Jacqueline Mina’s work, Devon Guild of Craftsmen’s John Makepeace exhibition at Somerset House and this year’s edition of Ceramic Art London. Meanwhile, colleagues attended two significant international Fairs: IMM Cologne and the Stockholm Furniture Fair.
I also attended the RSA/ACE State of the Arts Conference which considered how the arts should make their case in a difficult financial environment and also gave me an opportunity to raise the issue of the impact of education changes on craft and other artforms.
In addition to meetings in York and Plymouth, my colleagues and I have held meetings with representatives of the British Council, CCE – our partners on the pilot for the Portfolio strand of our Collective cpd scheme for makers investigating portfolio careers, UK Trade & Industry, Twisted Thread – a valued partner for recent Participation and Learning projects and the Art Fund, alongside catch-ups with Craft Champions Wright & Teague and Linda Barker – who spoke passionately about her love of craft at a recent Crafts Council event (thank you Linda!).
It was fascinating to visit the Mint Museum of Craft and Design in Charlotte, North Carolina for the finale of its inaugural exhibition Contemporary British Studio Ceramics: The Grainer Collection and the accompanying symposium with speakers including Tanya Harrod, Julian Stair, Neil Brownsword and Kate Malone. Marc and Diane Grainer have built their collection of British ceramics over many years and this exhibition was a testament to that commitment.
We are looking forward to SOFA New York which again precedes COLLECT by some weeks. Finally, I am delighted to be taking part in the Southbank Centre’s forthcoming Alchemy event to discuss sustainable models that put economic power into the hands of traditional artists, craftsmen and scholars
Funding
And now I return to the changes in public funding that I mentioned in my introduction. No-one could have missed the press coverage of what has been a seismic change in arts funding in this country with organisations of all artforms trying to come to terms with the impact. We continue to talk to craft organisations and to other partner organisations about changes in funding and what it will mean to them and to craft. Most have a combination of public, earned and raised income, so the effects of any recently-announced changes are not straightforward and for many the impact is not yet clear.
The Crafts Council has been accepted onto the Arts Council’s new portfolio of funded organisations, albeit with reduced levels of funding over the next four years. Like other organisations, we are considering how to take forward our programmes sustainably, minimising the impact on our support to makers, audiences and craft.
Read our statement here.
Regrets…
I was saddened to hear that Anita Besson will be closing her gallery in June. The good news is that Anita plans to continue to work on projects but I will miss the space and the light and always the highest quality of ceramics at Besson Gallery.
Finally, and very sadly indeed, I mark the death of Jane Phillips, Director of Mission Gallery in Swansea, who passed away on Sunday 6th February, after a long illness. Jane was a great supporter of the visual arts and crafts in Wales and she will be greatly missed.
A sad note on which to end. But I wish you all well for the spring and look forward to being in touch again around the time of COLLECT when we will have a fantastic range of activities and work to enjoy.
