A Return to the Real - by Stuart Reid, Curator of The Tom Thompson Memorial Gallery, Owen Sound, Ontario

The flurry of images and information that emanates from the media maelstrom swirling around us daily can be very distracting. It is possible in today's western world to lose a holistic sense of life and a healthy hierarchy of priorities. As the pace quickens and the demands of "keeping up" threaten to disturb our sense of belonging, we reach out for opportunities to reconnect with a shared symbolic language, a glimpse of elemental truth, a deeper sense of being in the natural world.

Drinking from a vessel, seeking warmth under a quilt, relaxing in a chair, adorning oneself with a piece of jewellery — all these engagements with objects connect the user to a subjective understanding of being in the body. To examine the validation offered by craft objects in particular, I will root my discussion in the real experience, in this case in critical observation of some of the works that have been selected by curator Paul Greenhaigh for the exhibition Looking Forward. By focusing on properties, details and the makers' intent, I hope to shed some light on the way such encounters with craft can reassure us in a language that considers our bodies, beings and lives, collectively and individually.

The series of three Jacquard weavings made by New Brunswick weaver Vita Plume is an excellent example of how contemporary craft provides context for new technologies by building bridges to human histories. It is interesting to note that the genesis of the computer is rooted in the technology of the Jacquard handloom, an eighteenth century invention that encoded complex instructions into a series of endlessly alternating patterns of on and off motions.

The three panels woven by Plume depict, in a grid formation, six photographic enlargements of the iris of the artist's eye. Plume has used a computer program to "craft" the images of her own eyes, then worked the output into the woven structure. The high-contrast pixilated images hover visually on the surface of the panels, yet are fully integrated into the intricate patterning of traditional Latvian designs employed in the Jacquard weave. Plume has utilized photo-graphic and computer technology, reinterpreted the resulting image using craft technology and, in the end, manifested warm, comforting objects — each large enough to envelop the viewer.

The pattern of the weave is evidence of the maker's identity as a second generation Latvian/Canadian. She writes, "I often use images and patterns in an attempt to express the transformation, loss, disintegration, memories and dichotomies of Latvian culture as I experience them." Plume acknowledges that the forced occupation of Latvia and massive emigration to the West after the Second World War directly affected her family. As her work demonstrates, con-temporary craft objects are evidence of a confluence of histories both personal and universal, of technologies both historical and modern, and meanings that are sometimes applied, and more I often embedded, in the making.

Handmade objects speak, too, about the properties of natural materials, about the value of technique and skill garnered over extended periods of experimentation. The objects in Looking Forward testify to a collected inheritance of knowledge that spans centuries and continues to grow.

The unfilled clay vessel by Steve Heinemann is an example of how understanding a material can create resonant art grounded in human experience. The traditional clay vessel puts us in touch with basic human needs, such as the things we must carry. It is also a metaphor for the sense of emptiness that we bear, encompassing feelings of hunger, thirst, longing and regret. Delicate poetry is at work in Heinemann's contemporary treatment of this ancient form.

Heinemann's vessel embodies the tensions and imperfections of a slip-cast vessel born of the rocking motion of clay poured into a mould. One observes the slight warp in the curve of the bowl's lip, betraying the ellipse, giving it the character that separates it from the machine made. There is a fragility to the shell-like form, so thinly fashioned. One can imagine picking it up and the way our arms would carefully cradle the bowl, its form determining the shape of the void in our arms.

The decoration on this piece is primitive yet sophisticated in its elegant minimalism: lines of dashes score the inside of the vessel, an oval drawn on the bottom of the interior with darker pigment is bisected lengthwise by an axis. Given its simplicity, any interpretation of the symbolism should be open ended. Perhaps the marks depict a mapping of the celestial movement of planets, perhaps the oval shows the level of liquid that is required for a certain ritual — regardless, the marks speak of human intervention and an appreciation for the beauty of movement and balance. Such imperfect, poignant marks show what the human hand is capable of making.

Contemporary craft recognizes that surfaces can carry meaning. By inscribing text onto form, craftspeople react to the bombardment of messages from the mass media. However, those represented in Looking Forward do not work with arbitrary graffiti or coercive instruction, but instead carefully apply word and message to complement and enhance the integrity of the object.

Ellen Adams has beaded a border that depicts a running pixel board displaying stock trading information to frame her quilt called Declining Stocks. The quilt addresses the impact of big business on the natural world, particularly the effect on the crisis of depleting fish stocks on Canada's east and west coasts. Paul Mathieu uses the text of a poem by Greek-Egyptian poet Constantine Cavafy as a point of focus on his grouping of brightly coloured pots called Afternoon Sun. The poem dealing with memory and loss is complemented by a background of sensual blossoms that the artist calls both funereal and overtly sexual. Beth Albers has raised a word in Braille on the handle of her sterling silver spoon called Vital just where it will be touched by the user's fingers.

In these instances, the use of text or messaging is far removed from the didactic and aggressive commercialism of the mass media. Instead, each piece invites thoughtful contemplation of the meanings that exist in tandem with the objects. The placement of the words invites a closer inspection of the surfaces and, ultimately, a more intimate encounter with the form. Reading dictates a certain time orientation: we must slow down, take our time and absorb meaning. Our reward, as found in these examples in Looking Forward, is a message that is essential, non-manipulative and well placed, giving the viewer a greater insight into the artist's thinking.

Since the advent of the industrial revolution, craft practice is no longer indispensable, having been replaced in great part by mass production. With technology as its foil, however, craft has continued to be a proponent for evolution in design and in the innovative use of natural and man-made materials. Craft practitioners lend authenticity and a sense of individual identity to the objects they produce. Mass production cannot mimic the connections that exist in the handmade industry between colleagues - teachers and students, makers and consumers, artists and critics — ties that bind the crafts community together in Canada.

The work ethic inherent in the lifestyle supported by craft production is being cited as a role model for the digital age. In his book called Abstracting Craft: The Practiced Digital Hand, theorist Malcolm McCullough builds a case for upholding human traits and values in developing and using digital technologies. He broadly groups handmaking with all artistic practice when he states:

What all such crafts share is not just technique, or hard work on form, but also a probing of their medium's capacity, a passion for practice, and moral value as an activity independent of what is produced. Is there any reason to expect these in the electronic realm? We must make them our goal.'

There is a convergence of imagination and hard work, as well as evidence of a passion for practice, in many works included in Looking Forward. Ryan Legassicke adds a dash of performance to the mix in his piece of furniture called This is Wood. The reductive gesture of his roughly hewn bench draws us back to the first time someone sat on a fallen log in the forest. In the present day, clear cutting of forests threatens to upset the ecological balance that sustains life. There is, consequently, a refreshing truth in the unfinished nakedness of the wood in this piece — the monumentality of the tree is retained. The structure relies on the simplicity of a basic joint from which the bench is cantilevered. Clarity and wit have been combined, cutting to the essence of forward-looking craft: ingenuity meeting art, meaning juxtaposed with purpose, history overlapping function.

Encounters with the works in Looking Forward bring us back to a sense of the real, to a sense of our own beings and bodies. These objects are talismanic, putting us in touch with the rich tapestry of human history and the associated collective memory of the roots of modern technologies. They reaffirm the power of the human hand that drives them. They also propagate valuable relationships in the teaching of traditions, the passing of information from mentor to student, and in the many interchanges that take place in the craft marketplace. Looking forward from the fast-paced, reality-challenged virtual world surrounding us, we see increasing value in our ongoing relationship with craft and find reassurance in knowing that hands have the power to shape and reshape that world. 

1 Malcolm McCullough, Abstracting Craft: The Practiced Digital Hand (Cambridge, London: Massachusetts      Institute of Technology Press, 1996), p.29