(no subject)
Oct. 12th, 2005 01:33 amThanks to comments from
firinel and
danaewhispering, I've been musing on the dreaded 'art vs. craft' debate for most of the evening. Fin said With the mindfulness that you do them, you're less hobbiest, and more artist. I *like* this idea, which had never occured to me before, because it leads into questions of what the particular conscioussness an artist brings to something *is*, if such things can be described, and how that affects (effects? it's 1:30am, my grammar-fu is weak) the product. It also brings up a simple concept that makes me question how valid the name of 'artist' is, when applied to me.
I follow patterns.
Mind you, the patterns that I follow are *gorgeous* things, I've posted links to them dozens of times - Alice Starmore's Elizabeth I, Lavold's Menja, etc. Still, I'm following a blueprint, formming the stitches in the precise way I'm instructed to, going for and (hopefully) getting a result that is a replica of the creation of another. An act of creation, but lacking creativity.
I want to do my own designing, bring the creativity into creation. I even have ideas for sculptural knits - faery dolls. However, my designing skills are a bit weak, which is I think mostly a matter of impatience, and I'm regularly at war with myself over producing something that just *is*, rather than is *usable*. Those are my own weaknesses, and I think with some study and struggle I'll overcome them.
Now, I know there is a type of magic I bring to the creation of a pattern, a will and consciousness placed into the stitches, but I don't know what it is, or what it 'qualifies' as. I expect a lot of this is my own nervousness about my right to any label I admire, such as artist, but it seems the solution is clear - move past those things I consider blocks to that concept. Still, the first questions I mentioned about the idea are interesting, at least.
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I follow patterns.
Mind you, the patterns that I follow are *gorgeous* things, I've posted links to them dozens of times - Alice Starmore's Elizabeth I, Lavold's Menja, etc. Still, I'm following a blueprint, formming the stitches in the precise way I'm instructed to, going for and (hopefully) getting a result that is a replica of the creation of another. An act of creation, but lacking creativity.
I want to do my own designing, bring the creativity into creation. I even have ideas for sculptural knits - faery dolls. However, my designing skills are a bit weak, which is I think mostly a matter of impatience, and I'm regularly at war with myself over producing something that just *is*, rather than is *usable*. Those are my own weaknesses, and I think with some study and struggle I'll overcome them.
Now, I know there is a type of magic I bring to the creation of a pattern, a will and consciousness placed into the stitches, but I don't know what it is, or what it 'qualifies' as. I expect a lot of this is my own nervousness about my right to any label I admire, such as artist, but it seems the solution is clear - move past those things I consider blocks to that concept. Still, the first questions I mentioned about the idea are interesting, at least.