IC Projects
Jellyfish Necklace by Charlotte de Syllas, part of the Matter series
IC:Innovative Craft - Team
Administrator: Nick Duxbury
Image: Chris Holmes
Being a relative newcomer to contemporary crafts and having come from a visual arts background I am fascinated to see the meeting of traditional craft methods and 21st century technological approaches at work. The parallels between contemporary craft and visual art can be too readily over-looked and watching any maker progress their ideas from sketches through the raw materials to finished objects resonates with me in ways that visual art and music also do. To put these objects into creative and expressive exhibitions that challenge the preconceptions of craft, makers and, ultimately, the ways audiences interact with these is the very essence of why I applied to work for IC:Innovative Craft.
Having graduated from Dartington College of Arts with a BA(Hons) in Writing (Contemporary Practices) in 2006 Nick worked steadily to establish himself as an artist and performer from a base in the Midlands.
Immediately after university Nick primarily worked with words and visual installations, under the pseudonym Jeb Rand, to try to produce work that could be considered as an extended ‘book’, whether it be a stand alone piece of art, several pieces that create a whole piece or actual page-based writing. Over the last eighteen months Nick has been developing his technique as a painter and installation artist through work with abstract landscapes - see his website for images and information www.nickduxbury.co.uk
As a musician Nick has toured with a successful folk band and a less successful comedy band up and down the country. Before joining IC, Nick worked as a Community Arts Administrator for Kajans Women’s Enterprise in Aston, North Birmingham through the torrid time of both losing Arts Council England funding and trying, successfully, to complete funding applications for a £1.2million capital redevelopment programme.