Extracts from Peter Dormer's final chapter in Dormer, P. ed. (1997) The Culture of Craft: Status and Future (Studies in Design and Material Culture) Manchester: Manchester University Press.
The headings are Dormer's.
'The reason for calling craft a practical philosophy is that almost nothing that is important about a craft can be put into words and propositions... a disciplined craft is a body of knowledge with a complex variety of values, and this knowledge is expanded and its values demonstrated and tested, not through language but through practice.' (219)
Following the rule book
'For the past thirty years some crafts have been
redefined in their content, aspirations and in how they are taught by theories
of education that emphasise the importance of learning through finding things
out for oneself...
But it is arguable that... an assumption was made that has never been justified
empirically, even though it is widely held ideologically - the assumption
being that rules, formulas and instruction are necessarily restrictive upon
creativity. Yet in reality the use of rules and formulas is pragmatic: they
are an efficient means of helping novices become experts.' (220-221)
Honest Work
'...there has been a strengthening of interest in
the general issue of personal identity...
...discursive philosophies such as Existentialism are not the only or oven
the main areas in which people seek clarification of who they and what they
stand for. People most often find coherence and clarification of their values
through what they actually do.'
(221-222)
'...craftspeople quite often use the phrase 'honest work' when they want to praise one of their peers for the quality of what they have produced...' (222)
' ...a good many artists know about honesty in work because they cheat. (This is done by) continuously changing one's mind during the course of making an object and... hiding one's ignorance from oneself.' (222)
Honest craftspeople 'work strenuously to clarify their goals and seek out rules, not only of making, but also of procedure... the rules of making are 'how to' rules which, once assimilated... can be forgotten or even broken. Rules of procedure are those rules that a craftsperson uses to keep him- or herself on track for the intended goal.' (222)
An example: 'Huxley Jones built his portraits using
small flattened pellets of clay. He was adamant that once you placed a pellet
on the head then that was it: his rule was - you do not move that pellet.
(His) rule was his means of helping himself towards
finding and then maintaining the truth of what he was doing...
There is an element of profundity here... His rule is an affirmation of his
self-respect. It helped him maintain his integrity.' (224)
On Wanting to be Right
'Each craft involves connoisseurship, and connoisseurship is a part of tacit knowledge...' (225)
'The mystery aspect associated with connoisseurship is usually overdone. It is often relatively easy for a connoisseur to demonstrate the knowledge by producing different samples for the novice or student to compare and test.' (226)
A Non-Theoretical Activity
'...the precious rules and the formulas of the craft... are vulnerable to theorists and their scepticism. Hardly a rule or a formula can be defended by a craftsperson's own verbal argument once the theorist's scepticism has been turned on full heat. Why this rule and not another? How can you justify that this approach is intrinsically better than that? Every blessed thing the connoisseur or craftsperson says can be destroyed philosophically.' (229)
'The craftsperson cannot very easily explain the rightness of what he or she has achieved; other people have to recognise it. They have to see it... Unless a person can explain the principles of his or her actiivity - unless there is a theory about it - then he or she may be credited with having skill but not understanding... And then, because we have made our minds up that craftspeople do not understand the real meaning of what they are doing, we look elsewehere for explanations and in doing so miss the integrity of a whole other world of knowledge.' (229)
'Craft... is all bound in with tacit knowledge and
connoisseurship - knowledge that cannot be described very easily but which
can often be demonstrated. Because it cannot be described in a language it
will not easily be theorised and it is very hard to draw down into general
principles. But the facts of the knowledge can be demonstrated through example
and comparison...
What can only be shown cannot be written about, and to those who think there
can be a theory and a critical language of craft that is a warning worth heeding.'
(229-230)
