http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog/ Blog maintained by IC:Innovative Craft Acting Lead Director Amanda Game en info@innovativecraft.co.uk Copyright 2010 2010-05-19T10:30:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/spend_time_at_dovecot_before_23_may/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/spend_time_at_dovecot_before_23_may/#When:10:30:00Z {summary}Matter 2 has just opened, taking a more reflective step into the world of made things exploring, as it does, exquisite carved stone jewellery by Charlotte De Syllas.  Once again the rhythm of making is present but on this occasion it seems somehow weightless, infused with a different lightness of being.  Shadi Vossough’s photo essay on Charlotte’s studio is domestic, allusive, human.  We see hands at work sandwich making; glimpses of a workbench recently abandoned, scattered, with tools, books, pictures. A slowly shifting projection of sky with a murmur of natural sounds permeating the gallery slows down our gaze and draws attention to the glowing detail of carved jade, tourmaline, nephrite.  We feel the concentration of those clever, practiced hands.  Paxon, by taking time with his subject (including drilling 180 beach pebbles to suspend in the space!) has created time for us to look anew at the detail of things.  As this recent visitor and jewellery collector comments: ‘I spent a quiet hour looking at the pieces and the set - I have to say that this was the first time that I have been persuaded to look at a group of Charlotte’s work together and see what I think she’s actually saying through these carvings (Adam’s term - the right one); the film and the suspended-pebble screen reflect this. So different from the crowded babble of some jewellery displays, which pile up far too much in the dark.  Your show thinks about light, air, rain,sky, birds, a natural time-cycle and so forth.’ Amanda (Matter 2 is open 10:30-7:30 until Sunday 23rd May) 2010-05-19T10:30:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/matter_1_the_producers_view/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/matter_1_the_producers_view/#When:15:28:00Z {summary}Amanda Game on ‘Drummond Masterton’, curated by Adam Paxon, with the help of Matt Hulse, Guy Bishop, IC:Innovative Craft and Dovecot: Being hands off the curatorial process has been a challenge. Like teaching someone to ride a bike, there is always a temptation to demonstrate, to save time even, by grabbing the handlebars. But we have stepped back and watched the first wobbles, the odd grazed knee; tearful frustration and buckled mudguards transform into an extraordinary and exhilarating ride to the finish line. ‘Matter 1’ is installed. It is a visual feast, and for nine days only the North Gallery at Dovecot has become the place to get an introduction to digital maker Drummond Masterton, through the deft hands of our guest curator and jeweller Adam Paxon. ‘The Manual’, a new film made by Matt Hulse in collaboration with Adam, brings 20 minutes of poetry to process and allows Drummond’s articulate discussion of digital craft to be overlaid by brilliant action shots of cycle training; sawing and milling and strangely beguiling close ups of buttons, knobs, shelving systems and drills. A billet of aluminium, two terrain bowls (one generously loaned by our colleagues at National Museums Scotland) and a group of jewel like test pieces by Drummond, draw the eye from sketchbook to finished works. The maker’s dramatic projected image of a French glacier hints at background inspiration, alongside boxes of a rare vinyl collection and the Dunlop Pedal-Powered Record Player (another special commission, courtesy of Guy Bishop and The Dick Institute, Kilmarnock). Participation is possible – not through making a thing but pedaling a sound. Courtesy of the Dunlop Pedal-Power machine you can get on a bike to create your own sound with a version of ‘Jeff Mills: Waveform Transmission’ – amongst other rare finds of an internet vinyl trawl .Bring your own is also encouraged… find out how hard it is to keep an audible rhythm. What Adam has managed, with the able help of Guy and Matt, is to tease out and explore the hidden foundation of Drummonds’ exceptional skill and knowledge. ‘Matter 1’ is a visually complex, poetic and all round stimulating orchestration of finished objects, film, photography, voice and sound. As Michael Polanyi wrote ‘it is impossible to learn to ride until we actually mount the bicycle and give it a try’. Come and enjoy the show, it’s as easy as riding a bike… Amanda 2010-05-03T15:28:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/mr_mcfall_mr_bennett_and_a_unique_scottish_craft/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/mr_mcfall_mr_bennett_and_a_unique_scottish_craft/#When:14:18:00Z {summary}When I was taking my first baby steps into the world of folk music, whilst studying for my GCSEs, Martyn Bennett had a hugely significant role to play in the shaping of my scope of what was possible within the genre.  I was a non-traditional instrument player (bass guitar) and from a non-folk-centric family, so I had a certain outsider viewpoint from the start.  However, I had the misfortune of being English and playing music in English folk clubs. For those of you outside the English folk music world, this is a world where innovation is frowned upon and questioned, in the first instance, and reluctantly accepted over time.  It is also a world where, in 2003, when I was just starting university, the most significant step forward had come in 1969 with the ‘electrifying’ of folk music on Fairport Convention’s Liege and Lief.  It was also a world shocked by Jim Moray’s Sweet England (released in the middle of 2003) that took electric drumbeats, guitar effects and synthesisers to traditional English folk songs and split opinion completely in two. However, as young artists trying to do something different we could all cast an envious and hopeful glance north at the likes of Martyn Bennett, Peatbog Faeries and Shooglenifty who seemed to be celebrated for their unique Celtic fusion rather than chastised.  This year I was lucky enough to see Peatbog Faeries plying their craft as part of Celtic Connections in Glasgow’s Old Fruitmarket, sustaining strained foot muscles through over enthusiastic dancing in the melee of partying audience members of all ages (another rarity at English folk concerts), then on Good Friday seeing Mr. McFall’s Chamber playing their new Birds and Beasts album celebrating the work of Martyn Bennett at Edinburgh’s Queens Hall. Being a classically trained ensemble and in a seated venue this was obviously a little bit more subdued than one of Bennett’s notorious gig/raves out on the Scottish islands, however the complexity of his arrangements was made plain to see and I wished I’d been able to see Bennett live during his lifetime.  Celtic music is allowed to shift and evolve without the scrutiny that English folk music seems to have and the musicians, the genre and the craft benefits from this unique nature. Nick 2010-04-06T14:18:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/thinking_of_india/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/thinking_of_india/#When:15:22:00Z {summary}Remembering India is constant at the moment.  For those who haven’t already had 4 hours of holiday snaps and excited chat, I was lucky enough to spend 3 weeks traveling in Delhi and Rajasthan over Xmas, New Year, which I found inspiring, unsettling and wonderful in turn. Craft followed me everywhere – the intricate saddles of the camels we were riding in the Thar desert reminded me of the wonderful Peter Collingwood book, ‘The Maker’s Hand, A Close Look at Textile Structures’ (ISBN 1-85725-134-2).  A fascinating market celebrating hand-weaving in the centre of Mehrengarh Fort in Jodphur linked me straight back to Dovecot Studios – although Douglas and his team haven’t yet dug a sandpit to sit in to weave!  The carved stone screens in the magnificent Rajput palaces cast mesmerising patterns of light and colour across stone floors (as some 40 images show!)– which reminded me of Jo Barker’s brilliantly coloured tapestries inspired by Cairo which were on show in Follow A Thread.  I had a go at Hand Block Printing in the Anokhi Museum; got seduced by the different cutting techniques of sapphires and rubies in the shops of Muslim stone cutters in Jaipur.  Even wandering round a remote Jain temple site in Ossian, I found a craft familiar.  The British jeweller Ruth Tomlinson (whose current work is on show courtesy of Bishopsland at Dovecot) hailed me from behind a carved stone elephant.  She was traveling with the furniture designer Gareth Neal and (once we had overcome the confusion of strange meetings) they asked me whether I was traveling for work.  I stressed that this was strictly holiday, but on reflection I suppose the answer is not that simple………… Amanda 2010-02-11T15:22:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/down_out_up_and_up/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/down_out_up_and_up/#When:15:02:00Z {summary}It’s almost the last week of January and already Christmas seems a very long time ago.  For those of you with a keen eye on the Twitter feed you may have caught an insight into everything that goes on behind the scenes over the last couple of weeks.  With Amanda in India (more of that in another blog) for the Christmas period and then down in London to set-up a new exhibition at the Jerwood Space, it was left to me to steer the IC exhibitions in the right directions. Follow A Thread had to come down and be shipped out to the Harley Gallery in Nottinghamshire where it will spend the next two and a bit months in their lovely spaces and while it was travelling south, Taking Time was travelling north (luckily the weather had abated by now).  Luckily this transit period allowed us to make the South Gallery good again and prepare the storage spaces for the touring show’s packaging. However, just before Taking Time went up we also had delivery of work from the makers at Edinburgh Ceramic Studio for Frontroom Showcase and I had to poke my toe into the world of curation (albeit on a small scale) for the first time. Having been down to Coburg House and seen all the items I had all the knowledge I could have, but I don’t think anything quite prepares you for that moment when you unwrap them and see them side-by-side with the colours playing with one another and the bright lights casting strange shadows.  There are photos up on the Frontroom Showcase page and also on our new Facebook page. Then came the slow process of piecing together Taking Time.  Having seen it in Birmingham and with the time to reflect on all the pieces it could have been a lot worse, but in it’s entirety filling the whole South Gallery it did seem a bit daunting with the nagging question ‘where is it all going to go?’ being applicable to the pieces and the packaging.  You can see a brief overview of the exhibition through photos on the Taking Time event page and again through our Facebook page. Up next at Dovecot is the Bishopsland silversmithing and jewellery show with upwards of 60 pieces… I now have a much greater understanding of what goes into these things so I offer them all my best wishes. Nick 2010-01-21T15:02:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/image_craft/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/image_craft/#When:15:07:00Z {summary}We talk about cross disciplinary work often too blithely.  So often it doesn’t quite hit the mark. But when I saw this exhibition, I had that tingly sense of aha, this is it.  It made completely makes sense for the practice of one discipline to be seen through the eyes and ears of another.  Craft and the act of making objects is such a hands on, touch oriented process and often experience that you become so connected with the object and its making that you cant ‘see’ it properly.  Good craft objects have an intimacy that that can be mesmerizing, and personal; that sometimes to tell the story of that deep relationship needs a bit of distance. We usually use words and they really help, but these photographs and this connection between maker-object/process – camera-photographer, has opened a window of understanding and clarity.  I fell in love with Tord Boontje’s flowers at a Craft Council exhibition many years ago.  I was a little jealous when it became so available through Habitat but it meant I could visit it regularly.  To see him working, with the designs on his body as well as the wallpaper, with the inspiration of a few bottles of beer with friends just left, and a lightbulb with none of his flowers on his, is deeply reassuring. Each of the photos has a similar effect – I understand why I like the work so much in each one.  I get more of the subtleties by the ability to see through the thoughtful skilled eyes of another – sometimes it isn’t just the objects of course, sometimes it is the way of making, that is so engaging, so human, so personal, so driven/clear/ - they tell human truths.  And there is nothing more fulfilling to see feel hear know than that…. Roanne 2009-12-14T15:07:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/meaning_and_imagery_in_follow_a_thread/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/meaning_and_imagery_in_follow_a_thread/#When:16:41:00Z {summary}When Amanda invited me to include my work in an exhibition of tapestry, I was delighted to participate. I studied for five years in the Tapestry Department at Edinburgh College of Art under the direction of Maureen Hodge and then went on to teach there for another six years. I now live and work just outside of London and have just had a baby. The series of hand embroideries entitled ‘In the Garden’ was completed in 2006 with the launch of a publication, and was produced with SAC funding. The project was initially inspired by my own collection of domestic embroideries and research at the V&A. In 2004 I was artist in residence at Winterbourne Botanic Garden, University of Birmingham, where I made dozens of drawings and took hundreds of photographs. In the past, I had steered away from traditional embroidery motifs such as flowers and gardens, and more often subverted the medium; making stitched work with depictions of uncomfortable personal narratives. I decided that it would be a challenge to refer back to those traditional motifs. Could I find meaning in that kind of tranquil imagery? I worked outside during the residency, observing changes in the garden, looking closely at the roses which were going over, and watching the gardeners work; pulling old trees out of the ground, and turning the earth. The weather was turbulent; there were storms, rain that flooded and thunder that rolled over my head. Unlike the inert foliage in the embroideries that I had collected, the garden was in flux. There was so much change occurring in me at that time, and within the nature I was observing, that the inner and outer worlds collided in my drawings. You can view the embroideries, photographs and drawings from the residency on my website – www.annaray.co.uk During this year’s Edinburgh Art Festival I exhibited with STAR* (Scottish Tapestry Artists Regrouped) in ‘This is Now – From Drawing to Contexture’ where I showed my large-scale textile work ‘Knot’. My next major exhibition will be a two-person show with Maureen Hodge, ‘Maker and Mentor - two distinct voices’, which we propose to tour. Anna Ray 2009-11-25T16:41:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/the_lost_weekend/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/the_lost_weekend/#When:12:48:01Z {summary}As many of you will have read in January we are having a Craftspace touring exhibition called Taking Time: Craft and the Slow Revolution at the Dovecot building, so a few weekends ago myself, Amanda and David Weir took the train down to Birmingham to see the private view.  A very long and drawn out train journey it must be said, but with some stunning scenery along the south-east Scotland coast and then the dramatic entrance into England across the Tweed – quite a way to return to England for me having not been down for 3 months.  I would be interested in doing the journey we did as our return in the daytime as it snaked through the Pennines and the Lake District – Oxenholme The Lake District railway station name just conjures a great image, a shame it was pitch black yet only half 5 when we stopped there! It was lovely to spend some time getting to know the artists involved in the Taking Time exhibition (and there are a lot) and putting some faces to email correspondences both from artists and from Craftspace.  It was only as I said to Neil Brownsword, ‘I’m very familiar with your face’, that I realised how much like a stalker I may sound – luckily I was able to explain my familiarity as his picture is featured in our Image/Craft exhibition – phew! On the Saturday we went off in our different directions to see friends, relatives and, in my case, people I worked with and grew-up with – Amanda to Coventry to see the wonderful cathedral and me to Worcester to visit the Gallery at Bevere, where, shameless self-promotion time, some of my paintings are being sold.  In amongst the usual craft and art I came across a few Fran Priest boxes and some ceramics by Will Levi Marshall, which let me put work to familiar names, and then I saw some stunning pieces by an American, Thomas Hoadley (pictured above).  If I had the money I think I would have bought something… c’est la vie.  There were some very interesting pieces by Dan Stafford (also pictured above) and Vicky Shaw that I was particularly taken with. And then it was time to come back to Dovecot… so I seemed to loose the weekend through the professional danger of spending time looking at interesting craft only to come back to work and a host of craft, images and objects again on the Monday! Nick 2009-11-16T12:48:01+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/a_world_of_images/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/a_world_of_images/#When:13:37:00Z {summary}Thinking about photography has dominated the last few weeks, as decisions about different ways of digitally printing our 20 plus images for Image/Craft (size, paper type, finish etc.) have been explored at length.  Edinburgh photographer Michael Wolchover has been fantastic, searching out paper and board samples to help the decision making process.  A low point was looking at samples in the North Gallery with two photographers, a curator and a maker – none of whom agreed on the best way forward!  A high point was talking to National Museum Scotland’s expert printer, Steven Baird, (IC is producing this show in association with NMS) who guided us swiftly from indecision to clarity and a way forward.  Lots on in Edinburgh around photography at the moment.  ‘The Heart of the Great Alone: Scott, Shackleton and Antarctic Photography’ at the Queens Gallery, Holyrood is a beautiful collection of images by Herbert George Ponting and Frank Hurley which documents the landscape and the lives of the explorers in compelling ways that underline the skill – both technical (try taking a photograph at minus 40 degrees!) and artistic – of the photographers.  A different face of photography, ‘Salt of the Earth’ has just been unveiled at NMS – a collection of ‘famous faces with Scottish roots’ by Craig Mackay: lushly printed large scale portraits which invite the viewer into the lives of the sitters through carefully selected details and crops.  Image/Craft sits well in this context considering, as it does, the role of photography in creating the image, context and quality of contemporary making/makers.  Joanna Kane, an Edinburgh photographer and contributor to Image/Craft, who created the amazing Somnambulist exhibition at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in 2008, is helping IC develop a special photography event at Dovecot later in the year.  Watch this space for details! Amanda 2009-10-20T13:37:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/autumn_has_clearly_arrived_in_edinburgh/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/autumn_has_clearly_arrived_in_edinburgh/#When:09:06:00Z {summary}Autumn has clearly arrived in Edinburgh.  Heavy morning dews; wild winds and temperatures hovering around 12 degrees when the sun disappears, which it frequently does.  All that remains of this years International Festival are a few tattered posters and, at Dovecot, visitors books brimming with comments and suggestions.  The IC/Dovecot exhibitions continue until this Sunday 28th September when we finish, as last year, with a Doors Open Day event.  Then a pause, for IC, until our next exhibitions/events begin in mid-November. With Nick our Administrator holding fort at IC, I managed a few days walking in the French Pyrenees where the challenges of climbing 1,000 m rocky slopes in 29 degrees of sunshine put the challenges of IC and Dovecot into an attractively different perspective.  A quick shift from French mountains to Welsh hills followed with the opening of Follow A Thread – 6 Contemporary Approaches To Tapestry at Ruthin Craft Centre 10 days ago.  Greg Parsons and the Ruthin team had installed all the works beautifully and Matt Hulse’s new film ‘Lightworks – Many Hands’ has highlighted the potential of a new film space for the gallery.  Matt and co-exhibitors Sara Brennan, Jo Barker and Linda Green joined us for the opening, together with Francesca from Dovecot, and we managed to spread our Scottish generosity to local bars, 24-hour bus routes and knitting shops with great enthusiasm.  The other highlight of the past few weeks has been the opening of the new ceramic galleries at the V&A which puts contemporary making at the heart of a fabulous collection of historic ceramics in new and exciting ways.  Benchmark stuff for how museums can engage intelligently with contemporary craft.  We’re delighted to be involved in our own museum linked project through Image/Craft – an exhibition exploring the links between craft and photography that IC are developing with the National Museums Scotland which will become one of the shows at Dovecot in November.  A busy autumn beckons, Amanda 2009-09-23T09:06:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/getting_to_know_you/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/getting_to_know_you/#When:14:25:00Z {summary}Having started at IC:Innovative Craft all of 10 working days ago it is with great pleasure that I am able to write my first blog entry.  Just to quickly introduce myself, I am Nick Duxbury the new IC administrator, I have previously worked in Birmingham and Oxfordshire, I have spent the past 8 months living and working as an abstract landscape artist, examples of which can be seen through Facebook here, and I am a Dartington College of Arts Writing (Contemporary Practices) graduate. The last few weeks have been an immersion into life at IC and Dovecot and a blur of exhibition openings and events.  It was an honour to be present at the opening of the Jerwood Contemporary Makers 2009 exhibition and a privilege to communicate with and meet some of the artists/designers that have created the work.  There is still plenty of learning to be done, however it was great to be able to sit down with the Dovecot weavers and Alastair Salvesen after the exhibition opening and absorb information and stories about the building, studios and the future of it all.  I look forward to being able to say hello to you all in person when you visit the exhibitions and future IC events. Have a good festival if you are visiting or in the city, Nick, Administrator, IC 2009-08-18T14:25:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/new_threads_appearing/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/new_threads_appearing/#When:19:04:00Z {summary}On 24 July a small group of makers and curators gathered on the top floor of Edinburgh College of Art’s Evolution House (nothing to do with Darwin but lofty views of the Enlightenment city nonetheless) for a symposium on ‘Renewal’. Organised by Dr Jessica Hemmings, Associate Director for Visual and Cultural Studies at Edinburgh and Linda Newington from University of Southampton, the symposium brought together an eclectic mix of speakers exploring textiles against a background of different, contemporary settings. We learnt about group therapy for Camper Shoe designers on a Majorcan finca; shop dreams in Western Australia; and a powerful artistic response to the New Orleans Hurricane tragedy. The day was intriguing but the most intriguing of all was a web presentation from the American writer, Elizabeth Gilbert, about the nature of genius. The content of her talk was thought provoking but it was the nature of the transmission, through a website called TED: Ideas worth spreading that was fascinating. This website, developed in California, is the site of a wealth of filmed talks by leading figures from medicine to philosophy; the arts to social justice. Each of the films has been captured from an annual conference organised by TED with carefully invited speakers. Back at Dovecot textiles and the USA also connected, as six of us assisted the weaver Ismini Samanidou install her Jerwood exhibit of 16m of cloth, woven on a computerised Jacquard loom in North Carolina. It has created a fascinating architectural island in the heart of the North Gallery. The rest of the show is also looking good and many thanks to Julia Ravenscroft, Jerwood curator and Joel Kaplan, technician for their many hours of patient installing. The Reading Room is also now booked up, as it were, thanks to my colleague Elizabeth Goring and her son Adam. Finally, a quick trip to WASPS studios this weekend to see the collection of tapestries from the STAR group (Scottish Tapestry Artists Regrouped). Some strong work - worth a visit.  A number of exhibitors are included in the IC show ‘Follow a Thread’ for Ruthin Craft Centre in September which will be brought back up to the Dovecot in November. New threads appearing… 2009-08-03T19:04:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/a_busy_july_for_ic/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/a_busy_july_for_ic/#When:15:18:01Z {summary}In early July Edinburgh was hotter than Rome. Curious grey/brown streaks appeared on the stairs up to the IC office as though all the ambient water of 100 years of swimming pool life was finally drawn up through the fabric of the Dovecot building. This suitably damp presence provides a backdrop for a series of large pink and green duck illustrations guiding visitors up to the illustrator John Burningham’s exhibition on the balcony which opened in early July. Occasional rocket fuelled two year olds test the effectiveness of the double bar railing system on the balcony and a large stuffed gorilla hangs, slightly menacingly, over the Studio space. July in Edinburgh often has a sense of lull or pause - a moment of languor before the adrenalin of another Festival kicks in. School holidays are in full swing - the 4 x 4’s are away negotiating the narrow streets of Italy; the open fields of France or sitting, quietly, on the airport tarmac. The streets have a strangely deserted air and even those of us still working sense a different rhythm to the city - lighter, less familiar. At IC we have passed the holiday season preparing for the next 12 months of events at Dovecot. We have been form filling; statistic gathering; bill paying; brainstorming; recruiting; meeting; greeting; fundraising; talking; ordering lightfittings; reviewing progress; negotiating; hoping; praying; calling in favours; visiting workshops, galleries, degree shows; painting walls; reading; networking; planning and listening. All so we can continue thinking about and acting on those two words, ‘innovative’ and ‘craft’. Recently, we have sponsored Matt Hulse to participate in Tilda Swinton and Mark Cousins’ film journey in the Highlands, A Pilgrimage; we have part funded sculptor Scott Laverie to create a fabulous (installed Friday) modular Reading room; we have held a selection meeting in the stylish surroundings of the Bute Room for our craft and photography show with the National Museum of Scotland and have watched two2 men very slowly unload a large MOMART van full of the contents of Jerwood Contemporary Makers, ready for next weeks installation. Not that languorous really. 2009-07-26T15:18:01+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/exceptional_works_of_innovative_craft/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/exceptional_works_of_innovative_craft/#When:11:32:00Z {summary}Busy month. Sorry so little blog activity. Saw three exceptional works of innovative craft, as below: Crown Derby and Ken Eastman at The Scottish Gallery (3-27 June 2009) Take one exceptional Edinburgh trained potter; several bags of china clay; a set of exquisite industrial pattern books from the English Midlands, dating back to 1750s; mix in imagination, perserverance, mouldmakers, a lot of patience and a couple of enlightened dealers and watch something magical happen. The divergent histories of industrial production and independent studio production are brought together and reanimated in contemporary form. Eastman’s Crown Derby productions are sensuous, rich 21st century vessels which have retained the poetry of the handmade whilst exploring the potential of larger scale collaboration. His works may have arrived too late to save the historic British ceramics industry but they go a long way to creating an imaginative future for the field. Details of the exhibition are available on The Scottish Gallery website. Artists Rooms at the National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh (until November 2009) Have to thank Marina Vaizey for this one. Normally have Sunday off from art - to maintain work/life balance etc. En route to The National Association of Decorative & Fine Arts Societies lecture Marina was very keen to see the Artists Rooms at the Scottish National Galleries of Modern Art. The Anthony D’Offay collection’s first outing includes drawings and prints by American/Latvian artist Vija Celmins. Intense, poetic renderings of night skies; spiders webs; the surface of the sea. In the Phaidon book Celmins says she has: ‘always been interested in very impossible images. Things blowing up, things disappearing in a breath….,...my work has always been so involved in the physical… (the future) only comes with the making.’ These fragments from a conversation with the sculptor Robert Gober. I immediately make a connection between the intense process that has created these works and the rhythm of other kinds of making. Matt Hulse, ‘Follow the Master’ This linking line of making took me (despite my art free Sunday resolutions) to see a screening of ‘Follow the Master’ on Sunday. In the ‘eagerly awaited 75 minute debut feature from Matt Hulse…[who curated Filmcraft for us in January]… the audience joins the filmmaker on an invigorating walk following 100 miles of the South Downs Way in homage to this grandfather Eric, who died last year’ (see www.edfilmfest.org.uk for more details). Following a postcard theme… Dear Matt That was an extraordinary film.  Hard to make a film about loss without being sentimental, but somehow you pulled it off.  Not quite sure what my favourite bits are but they might include: the sound of windy weather on summer leaves, perfect for kite flying; silent drumming with and without the dog the shape of the shooting stick; setting sun; 96 union jack cocktail flags calling our attention to the details; the postcards; the long white chalk roads the end - mellow, thoughtful Moving and extraordinary.  Liked the postcard too… X Amanda ps when can we show it at Dovecot? Back at Dovecot Age of Experience has finished but Norma Starzsakowna’s wonderful hangings on show until 11 July. Then preparations in full throttle for installing Jerwood Contemporary Makers and the Reading Room - open from 5 August. 2009-06-29T11:32:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/on_travel_and_art/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/on_travel_and_art/#When:10:10:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: Getting to the Dovecot building these past few weeks has been something of a challenge. Partly because my preferred walking route up Castle Street, into Princes Street Gardens, across the tracks and up in the shadow of the Castle by banks of Spring flowers has been impossible courtesy of Tramworks – great plastic barriers deny access to all but a small part of the gardens. Partly because the temptation to work in the home office has been great as it allows coffee and computer breaks in the back garden in glorious sunshine. Partly because I seem to have been in London on average three days a week in the past month – researching an IC photography show for later this year with the National Museums, setting up and opening a small silver show, Silvermaker, at Contemporary Applied Arts and now, again, to see Collect at the Saatchi Galleries. One of the advantages of all this disjointed activity – and seeing so many spaces down here in London – is that when I do make it into Infirmary Street I am struck anew by the extraordinary quality of the spaces there.  Even the relatively humble (by Dovecot standards) Reception area, has been shown as a truly remarkable space partly through Keiko Mukaide’s re-creation of her Light of the North installation, originally created for Tate St Ives in 2006 and on show in Edinburgh until 31 May.  I am looking forward to Keiko discussing her work with Anne Ellis on 20 May. Artistic achievement is often stimulated by travel – in Keiko’s case from Japan to Scotland.  The Alastair Salvesen painting show also at Dovecot this month, co-ordinated by Francesca Baseby, underlines the value of travel in a different medium. A more celestial form of travel was seen in West Lothian at the weekend with the opening of the Jupiter Artland www.jupiterartland.org. An opening party concluded breathtakingly with a fireworks display orchestrated by the sculptor Cornelia Parker, which scattered moondust amongst the byngs of West Lothian. Despite claggy weekend weather, this bold, privately funded, commission brings together exceptional works from, amongst others, Andy Goldsworthy; Anish Kapoor and Anthony Gormley. Gormley was spotted on the Dovecot balcony the next day inspecting tapestries. Now that could be interesting. … 2009-05-15T10:10:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/every_vote_counts_help_raise_the_profile_of_craft/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/every_vote_counts_help_raise_the_profile_of_craft/#When:10:57:00Z {summary}Elizabeth Goring writes: People listening to Radio 4’s arts magazine programme ‘Front Row’ on the evening of Tuesday 5 May will have heard great news for the UK’s craft sector! Lord Puttnam announced the shortlist for the Art Fund Prize for the best museum or gallery – the second stage of a judging process that reduced the previous Long List from 10 down to four. I was thrilled to hear that one of our partners – Ruthin Craft Centre – has deservedly made it into that select group of four, seeing off fierce competition from the likes of the Sackler Centre for Education at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Lord Puttnam recounted his (completely justified) praise of Ruthin at such length that he had to be nudged to move on to discussing one of the other shortlistees before he ran out of time. (If you’re quick you can catch it on BBC iPlayer’s Listen Again service.) His comments included: ‘Ruthin Craft Centre is a lovely surprise, everyone who’d been there was knocked sideways by it, and it got four votes very quickly. It is run by people with amazing commitment and a historical commitment to arts in North Wales – the thing’s got it all actually – it is the sort of thing you would like to see replicated in every single region and community in the country.’ The presence of Ruthin Craft Centre on the Long List has already enormously helped raise the profile of craft, both in the wider arts sector and further afield. But it’s worth pointing out that the Art Fund Prize is worth £100,000 to the winner. How wonderful if that could be used to benefit craft, makers, their communities and potential audiences. Now it’s on the Short List, Ruthin has a very real chance of winning. The Ruthin team already has a long and distinguished history of doing excellent work for the sector, and now they have a stunning new building though which even more can be achieved. For the first time, the public can vote for the eventual winner of the Prize, and the popular vote will count as one vote at the final judges’ meeting. Can I encourage you to show your support for Ruthin? Log on to www.artfundprize.org.uk, hit Short List 2009 and follow the prompts through the very quick and simple voting process. Winner to be announced on 18 June…watch this space. Meanwhile, Innovative Craft is raising its profile internationally. Amanda and I have just had an Opinion Piece published in Metalsmith (the beautifully produced bi-monthly publication of the Society of North American Goldsmiths). It’s titled ‘Pursuing Innovative Craft. On the value of learning through doing’. We’ve already had some really good feedback about this article, and would like to hear your views too. For those of you who are not (yet) subscribers to Metalsmith, SNAG have kindly allowed us to put it onto our website.  www.snagmetalsmith.org 2009-05-07T10:57:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/april_in_action/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/april_in_action/#When:10:22:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: The ‘Age of Experience’ exhibition opened at Dovecot’s South Gallery on 3 April with a talk by one of the exhibitors, Fred Baier. London fog nearly intervened as he arrived two hours later than planned. Fortunately the waiting audience were happily entertained with an improvised talk between Barbara Rae and David Weir in the Reception Area (where Dovecot rugs designed by Barbara are on show as part of the Dovecot: Art and Making series). When Fred arrived he gave us a serious, engaging, humorous and informative introduction to 30 years of his furniture design, from early days scouring the junkyards of Birmingham to a recent commission for a school re-creating a 250-year-old felled oak as a play zone. Equally at home with the computer and the bandsaw, Baier has a rare ability to design and make studio furniture that engages with rather than rejects our contemporary high speed world.  At high speed I then travelled to London, Morvern and Caithness over the Easter break, my computer usefully propped up on hotel beds, car roof and roof tops to ensure that planning for future projects continues on the hoof. From the detail of how to instal 16 one-metre panels in the Reception Area in May (Keiko Mukaide’s ‘Light of the North’ from the Tate), to fine tuning the words for funding applications (‘sentenced to death’ as one maker observed), to negotiating dates for taking in shows called (with one felt a slight sense of irony), ‘Taking Time’.  A short Edinburgh break ensued, hugely enlivened by gorgeous Spring weather and a second talk – this time by Professor Dorothy Hogg MBE. Another serious and engaging presentation, Dorothy’s talk highlighted the exceptional quality of thinking that is present in small studio practice. The wealth of illustrated material – jewellery and projects – from a distinguished 30-year career was given tangible form when the audience was invited to punch out hallmarks on aluminium sheet at the close of the talk. The noisy bang of 50 people stamping punches was a great reminder that extraordinary objects are born of physical effort as well as imaginative thought. 2009-04-27T10:22:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/the_first_tentative_signs_of_spring/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/the_first_tentative_signs_of_spring/#When:16:36:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: A bluewash of hyanciths outside the front door. Sun slanting across Edinburgh roofs – but a biting, don’t-abandon-your-coat-yet wind still whipping from somewhere Baltic. March has slid by in a blur of more studio visits – Scottish maker Drummond Masterton in Cornwall – and seeing extraordinary large computer milling machines thrumming like a giant foundry in the heart of Magnolia-lit Cornwall.  Had a whistle stop tour of the screeching, grinding, juddering world of making at the University of Falmouth – a long way from the gentle thrup of throwing clay, or the scratching of the paintbrush. Reassuring that things are still made at art college, in Cornwall at least. All the wonderful Cornish gardens were in full fledge – operatic camellias; subtropical magnolias and the pale blue seas beyond. It felt like an escape to Prospero’s magic island. Back in Edinburgh, Prospero prevailed in two extraordinary workshop days at the Dovecot given by a company of that name (www.prosperopartners.co.uk) to an assorted bag of arts professionals interested in fundraising (who isn’t these days?). It was a very focused, fascinating 48 hours – well planned and thought provoking.  The previous week the Edinburgh Festivals had held a breakfast party at Dovecot to launch the Festival Expo Fund. Attended by Mike Russell, Minister for Culture, External Affairs and the Constitution, the mood was Festive and the Minister was engaged by the colour and activity of weaving in that exceptional space,. (Ironically, though, craft is not represented on the Festivals board.) More Festival talk looms, with the University of Dundee hosting a further session on 28 April exploring the idea of A Festival of Craft in Dundee in 2010. Each gathering in the building seems to feed into the energy and possibilities that it offers.  At IC we are gearing up to installing Age of Experience next week in the South Gallery (open from 4 April – Wednesday – Saturday 11–5 until 20 June) and are working with Dovecot to prepare three linked shows in the Reception Area. The Reception shows begin with a display of paintings, monotypes and etchings on an Irish theme by leading Scottish painter Barbara Rae, alongside some of the works that she has created for the Dovecot Studios.  On 21 April Dorothy Hogg will be giving a talk on her recent work at the Studios as another event in our Thinking Through Craft series. More details on our website next week. 2009-03-26T16:36:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/timing_stitches_and_making_time/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/timing_stitches_and_making_time/#When:09:24:00Z {summary}Deirdre Nelson writes: I have been reading and thinking a lot about time recently……. my time. I am often asked of a piece of work ‘how long does it take?’ My answer is always the same …..‘I don’t know ‘. I have recently been involved in A Stitch in Time’ – an event/performance curated by Matt Hulse, produced by IC:Innovative Craft. It was a privilege to be involved in such an exciting collaborative event and it has opened up new ways of thinking and further opportunities for collaboration. It has also made me realise a few things about time. In preparation for A Stitch in Time’ I began to think about my ‘stitch’ in a new way as I demonstrated stitches to my new students: the filmmaker ( Matt Hulse) and a group of musicians (One Ensemble). As I worked with the group, I thought more about the timing and rthymn of each stitch I was making. The performance was to be 45 minutes and each time I rethreaded my needle, the music would shift and change. Keeping time was important.  After discussion with One Ensemble I prepared to time my stitching convinced that the image we had chosen (that of a film projector loop) would be completed in no time at all.  It was only when I timed my stitching I became aware of just how long it takes. Before I even contemplated the activity of stitching as ‘performance’, as a maker I was concerned with what I was to make: the final result. Ordinarily, in my practice, it is the output that is exposed – the final object. It is this which demonstrates my skill and expresses my activity and ideas. In the planned performance of A Stitch in Time’, the physical act of making would be the main focus, not the finished object. This was a hard shift for me to make in my mind as a maker of things where the focus is the finished object. Although enthusiastic about the collaboration and event, I hadn’t fully considered how I would feel working in front of an audience. I was well aware the audience would be involved in viewing many other aspects of the event (including weavers weaving; films projecting and looping, musicians playing and bobbins and bonnets bobbing). In spite of this I became very self conscious. To begin with, I sat awkwardly, creating an uncomfortable posture in order to work. I became very aware of time. The first ten minutes felt like the longest minutes I have ever spent stitching. I became aware of each awkward stitch I was making. This time, my lack of skill was exposed. While I spent time concerned about ‘my’ making, the audience were spending time relaxing and observing the beautiful film projected, the bobbins and bonnets bobbing, the musicians playing and the hands of the weavers weaving. My experience stitching in the event wasn’t quite the same as those experiencing it. One year on after being selected for Jerwood Contemporary Makers, I now have time to reflect and celebrate my achievement. When selected I was concerned about my time. I was trying to balance time on an artist’s residency with completing a large commission and preparing work for Collect at the V&A. I was also preparing to go and take time out to do voluntary work in Cambodia. I was concerned about my time but also the expectations of being a Jerwood exhibitor. After a very busy time, I am now trying to take time to think. Reflecting on my practice, I think of myself an artist who takes time to create and search out appropriate projects and opportunities in order to make work. Each time, I try to create a comfortable environment in which to work. Although I often work in collaboration with others, I am now more aware that the private space I need (in order to physically make) and the atmosphere I create around me allows me to get lost in making. As a result I become totally unaware of the time it takes. So when next asked ‘how long did it take to make? I will probably say yet again, ‘I just don’t know’. http://dstitched.blogspot.com/ http://www.craftspace.co.uk/page.asp?fn=2&id=57&stp=1&grp=2 2009-03-18T09:24:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/talking_opening_and_winning_a_week_of_hectic_activity/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/talking_opening_and_winning_a_week_of_hectic_activity/#When:15:24:01Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: Last week was dominated by journeys around relationships between place, people, art and vital communities. The week began in North Argyll, planning a weekend event for June, in Morvern, hosted by the Andrew Raven Trust on the subject of Vital Communities. It then progressed via very long hours on Powerpoint to a day event, last Wednesday, organised by the University of Dundee, to explore how a partnership between the Victoria & Albert Museum, the Universities in Dundee and the City itself could result in both a fabulous new museum building and a regenerated waterfront for Dundee. Contributions from the Guggenheim Bilbao team, the V&A, the Baltic, Newcastle and Dundee councillors, university staff and the local MSP created a fascinating overview of the value of investment in the arts – a critical debate at a time when the shape of future arts funding in Scotland is under scrutiny. IC’s contribution took the form of a simple reminder to those present that if the sort of art that the V&A represents so well – ranging from fashion to contemporary ceramics; sculpture to modern jewellery – is seen as of value to urban development, then it needs to be invested in at all levels. Remember to invest in the maker and their art not just the buildings to house it! We found some lovely existing connections between V&A and Dundee from the late Angus Suttie to contemporary Australian/Scottish artist Stephen Bird.  The latter part of Wednesday involved enjoying the combined hospitality of Scotrail, National Express and Northern Rail, ending up in Middlesbrough at about 10.30 that evening. ‘Raising the Bar’ opened at MIMA the following day. Curator James Beighton had ensured the show looked stunning in the upstairs gallery of this striking new building and there were lovely links to be explored between this show and concurrent Hayward drawing show ‘The End of the Line’. Other links between exhibitor Michael Rowe and his site-specific MIMA commission and between a metal show and a town founded on steel made this a rich, fascinating experience. I was also lucky to have the chance to get behind MIMA’s green baize door to see their outstanding contemporary ceramics and jewellery collection.  Another series of train journeys back to Edinburgh on Friday and a quick dash to Prestonfield House for a Communicators in Business Award evening – the IC site was shortlisted for an award in the Best Website category. Although pipped to the post by Historic Scotland’s Edinburgh Castle website, we were Highly Commended – which was very encouraging given our modest size and resource. IC’s communications consultant, Jenny Carter, had co-ordinated a lively table of IC folk and we all enjoyed a good dinner and fascinating glimpse of the Communications industry community.  The daylight hours of the weekend were spent doing time with a vital community of weeds that were flourishing in my long-neglected garden and reflecting on how we can rise to the challenge at IC of continuing to create the space for the vital community of making.  Age of Experience is the next show – and we will need all our combined experience to face the challenges ahead.  2009-03-06T15:24:01+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/no_sense_of_hurry/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/no_sense_of_hurry/#When:21:10:00Z {summary}Thank you to Scottish playwright and novelist Chris Hannan http://www.chrishannan.co.uk for writing such a great response to A Stitch in Time:: For me a sign of exceptional art is that it creates a sense of spaciousness. With Chekhov or Matisse, say, there’s no sense of being hurried or hectored or bullied into a response, you give it freely.    There was definitely that sense about the opening night ‘A Stitch in Time’ event. The lighting had a meditative feel; wherever you looked there was a lot going on - film, music, weaving - but none of it was shouting that it was more important than the rest. Everything had room around it.    When you’re given so much mental space it’s like wandering around a big open field. You know there are other fields but you find you are interested in this one and you want to know what it is that’s so particular about it. You haven’t been cornered in any way. You just decide to look closer.    I got very interested in the ’flutterbox’ instrument one of the musicians had made. I think that happened because the event had sensitised me to making. The weavers were weaving, Deirdre Nelson was stitching, so I tuned in to the tactile, the practical, the physical. The flutterbox was an insane-looking construction, made out of a drum, bike wheel, gurney castor-wheels, wingnuts. The sounds it made I’d never heard before and because it wasn’t a known instrument like a guitar I had no received idea of how it should be played so that alone was fascinating. And the musician was bent over it like it was a loom or something. 2009-02-18T21:10:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/in_touch_with_making_again/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/in_touch_with_making_again/#When:15:10:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: Always, it seems, one is on to the next thing. The next meal, the next sleep, the next day, the next artefact, the next journey, the next project. Intoxication with nextness makes it hard to find a space to reflect on the recent past and all things in it that have made it both strange and extraordinary.  FilmCraft, curated by Matt Hulse for IC/Dovecot is one such strange and extraordinary thing from the recent past. It has left me, and others, with a feeling of permission to do the things that matter; permission not to be driven by models of funding, interpreting, seeing and enjoying the arts that reduce everything to a game of numbers and compromised imagination. It has replaced a sense of the competitive with a sense of the collaborative, and the magic of that is weaving its way seriously through a growing network of individuals to who knows what end, but certainly there is more than a lingering feeling of lightness and pleasure. Hard work, long hours, crap pay, unforgiving spaces and intermittent recognition are often the rewards for imaginative life – whether through tapestry, film, words or paint. These things are not a given but nor is material, or critical, success. And for those of us who are merely interpreters at the fringes of the extraordinary, it matters that we keep remembering that the success of any work of art depends on the lightened (not enlightened) experience of an individual in contact with it: and that experience can be shared in many important ways that are hard to measure by statistical accounts. The next project has introduced me to a wonderful photography book called Things – A Spectrum of Photography 1850 -2001, generously given by Martin Barnes from the V&A. In the introduction, the critic Marina Warner writes the following words: ‘In Russian there is a word for “thing” with no precise equivalent in English: “vesch” means a “thing with a soul"….. a thing that resonates and possesses vitality and significance ….presence and feeling’.  Such was FilmCraft, for which Matt Hulse and his team deserve exceptional thanks. And please read the words below by Matt, in which he kindly shares his thoughts about the whole project. Matt Hulse writes: An unexpected outcome for me as curator/producer of the FilmCraft weekend has been a full realisation of the fact that, over the years, I have let myself drift in and out of touch with actual making. That may come as a surprise to folk who think of me as ‘a real doer’ but I do often forget that objects reveal their own unique stories, that the world is rich with fascinating things that speak to us directly without saying a word, and that as a film maker one may simply observe and record. There have been contributing factors to my faltering connection with making – teaching has at times tapped a little too much sap and the cerebral gymnastics demanded of screenwriting can too easily divorce one from the simple act of picking up a camera. However, I’m delighted to say that working with IC and Dovecot has genuinely revived my connection with material, with the tactile, with actual stuff. Making is definitely back at the heart of my practice, and I’m particularly grateful to the weavers, Deirdre Nelson and Amanda Game for helping me find my way back to the things that really matter – not least through the process of ‘thinking through craft’. That shift started me thinking about my work and my relationship with making, and how it has been possible for me, from time to time, to lose these crucial connections. I suspect it has quite deep-set roots in my learning experience. When I was about 11 years old, I remember a woodwork lesson in which we were set the task of creating a spatula from a simple rectangular block. When it came to the end of term, each pupil’s handiwork was laid out on the teacher’s desk in ascending order, according to how ‘well done’ each one was – based on how closely it resembled the original template. Marked as a percentage, my effort came in at around 40%. In a comprehensive school where vocational skills were paramount, this wasn’t a great result. I can still see the sad, distinct little spatula with its rather too-thin neck looking back at me, begging to be freed from the fringes of the humiliating line-up. I was frustrated by the mark I had been given, not least because I had really enjoyed the process, in particular the way the spokeshave had created delicate, curled shavings of wood. My fascination with and care for the material in hand had gone completely unnoticed on the official scale, despite me having put much soul into its crafting. I felt the essence of my achievement had been overlooked. (Ironically perhaps it was my enjoyment in the action of the spokeshave that had rendered the spatula a little too thin.) This was an early knock to my confidence in ‘making’ but it also taught me an important lesson in how success is perceived and measured. I knew then, with a child’s clarity, that if I wanted my ‘way’ to be valued, I’d need to begin creating my own templates to work from/through, rather than accepting the existing, or given, structures. Become a maker, rather than merely a player, of games. This instinct has taken some 30 years to evolve into something that I can articulate but all along it has been fundamental in my approach. Perhaps it’s my need to promote (and protect) different way of doing things that draws me to and from actual making. In a sense I have one ‘objective’ self looking out for that 11 year old, making sure he’s more widely understood and appreciated, whilst the other bit of me is just busily getting on with things, never mind what people think. To draw this back to FilmCraft, the opening night’s performance and installation ‘A Stitch in Time’ represents a pretty clear demonstration of this modus operandi and I hope the event showed how successful it can be. My primary role was to develop a template for the evening that enabled all involved to do what they do best, in their own way, in response to and collaboration with one another. I encouraged everyone to trust in a positive outcome of the joint effort, and expected folk to accept the reality that – as the sum of many parts rarely brought together – the specific nature of ‘the finished piece’ was essentially unknowable. Importantly, I was at pains to point out that it could also fail, but that it was a risk well worth taking. (It’s much easier of course to be confident about these things when one is working alongside brilliant, open-hearted and talented people – with a sense of humour.) The open-ended template I evolved with everyone’s input was originally inspired by stitching and weaving - activities which bring and hold materials together. I truly hope that more ideas and actions will flow from this, and that as a result, the intellect, the heart and the hand will forge more fond connections. 2009-02-12T15:10:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/textile_study_day_proves_extraordinary/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/textile_study_day_proves_extraordinary/#When:15:07:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: ‘Professional, informative, humorous, human’ was one of the many wonderful responses we have had from our 70 visitors to the Textile Study Day at Edinburgh College of Art/Dovecot last Saturday. Despite the lecture theatre being ‘a tad cold’ (a rather polite comment for the breath-visible temperature) our three morning speakers, Sue Prichard; Alan Shaw and Deirdre Nelson kept audience and each other captivated, entertained and informed.  We learnt about the importance of improvisation – whether through dusting the cornices of a 30-ft high museum gallery; adapting the internal workings of £600,000 worth of digital print machinery or embroidering shirts to improve the mood of Australian customs officials – in achieving extraordinary events. We were drawn into a wealth of visual imagery ranging from volunteers patiently sorting of piles of pebbles in the V&A; a Glaswegian courier proudly displaying his digitally-printed, sporran-integrated tartan shorts and shots of lively auctions of bottles of Australian rain water.  After a varied diet of sandwiches in the office and a few anxious moments in which Jenny Findlay, the IC administrator, conjured up a missing projector and several missing chairs, we regrouped in the Dovecot building to hear Sara Brennan and Moyna Flannigan in conversation alongside Sara’s tapestries (apologies for the roar of the air conditioning) and then moved upstairs to the Weaving Floor for an improvised session with Douglas Grierson and Jo Barker around colour, yarn and tapestry. Cups of tea and handling sessions of hanks of wool, were followed by a preview, by Matt Hulse and Deirdre Nelson of his Filmcraft weekend (30 Jan – 1 Feb).  Some 20 plus then moved to the Scottish Gallery to have a special viewing of Jo Barker’s beautiful tapestry show. A hardy few continued the extraordinary conversations, stimulated by this extraordinary day, well into the night. All in all it felt like a fabulous collaborative effort, with real substance, beautiful objects and interesting people. Thanks to all and see you at Filmcraft. 2009-01-29T15:07:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/cloth_and_culturenow_a_review/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/cloth_and_culturenow_a_review/#When:17:17:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: Thank you to Edinburgh tapestry weaver, Fiona Hutchison, for her review, below, of the 2008 Cloth and Culture Now event in Manchester. Interesting to see how many speakers have a Scottish connection: University of St Andrews, University of Aberdeen and, as we emerge from IC’s first successful Textile Study Day (24 January), we hope to be continuing these textile connections in many ways here in Edinburgh. Cloth and Culture Now: Exhibition and Conference Held at Whitworth Gallery, Manchester. November 2008 Report by Edinburgh tapestry weaver, Fiona Hutchison The ‘Cloth and Culture Now’ exhibition, curated by Lesley Millar, showed the work of artists from Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Finland, UK and Japan. In making this selection, Millar was looking to find countries that had created links between their recognised traditional techniques and a developing contemporary art textile practice. This was not an exhibition of folk art or old traditions re-worked, although many of the artists made reference to their countries’ textile traditions and the role they played, both economically and culturally. The works on show grew instead out of a very personal response by the artists to questions of identity as revealed through their nations’ history and culture. Although geographical borders and demarcations between different cultures are blurring, it was still possible to see the links these artists have made to traditional practice. In looking around the exhibition, there was an immense sense of quality, not just in the ideas, but also in the manipulation of materials and execution of the work. The making skills involved in many of the works was impressive. A broad range of textile techniques was represented, from the beautifully constructed ‘Robbing Peter’ (installation in woven tapestry) by Shelley Goldsmith (UK) to the work of Ieva Krümina (Latvia) who has developed her own technique with polyethylene rubbish bags and print. In contrast, the woven optical fibre work ‘Reflective Surface’ by Helena Hietanen (Finland) took you into another dimension of light and space, while the work of the Japanese artists did not disappoint. Masae Bamba used ‘Shiborizome’, a tie dying technique to create ‘Flame’, an installation of vibrant orange silk that flickered across the gallery wall. Hideaki Kizaki draws his inspiration from natural and sustainable materials, in this case woven jute.  In his sculpture ‘Cocoon’, the natural characteristics and strength of the jute give the work a powerful presence. Mare Kelpman (Estonia) made use of 21st-century technologies of laser cutting in her work exploring the wealth of traditional Estonian embroidery patterns. Last, but by no means least, was the work of Lithuanian artists Eglè Granda Bogdaniené, and Lina Joniké. Bogdaniené works primarily with tapestry, cloth and felt but will use whatever technique she feels appropriate. In her work ‘Zemnya’ (The Lithuanian goddess of harvest) a human figure, constructed from tufted fruit and vegetables, is laid out on a white carpet ready for a funeral. This work illustrates the close relationship Lithuanians have with the earth. Similarly Joniké work ‘Memory of Architecture’, a digital print on canvas with hand embroidered forget-me-not flowers, reflects back to childhood memories of people and places, and of how they relate to the land. As much of the work in this exhibition was a personal statement, I was pleased to see that work was not hung in national groupings but as the work and space dictated. The exhibition ended with a one-day conference ‘A Sense of Place: Art and the Construction of Identity’. The conference examined the role of material culture (with focus on textiles) in constructing, national, local and folk identities. Dr Jeremy Howard (University of St Andrews) opened the conference with a talk ‘Embroidering the Truth’, introducing us to art textiles from the 1900s onwards. ‘Cloth, Clay and Identity in Wales’, presented by Dr Moira Vincentelli (University of Aberystwyth), was an entertaining look at Welsh identity, through the costume and customs and gentrification of tea drinking. The morning finished with Lesley Millar in conversation with two of the exhibitors, Kadri Vilires (Estonia) and Severiji Incirauskaité-Kriauneviciené (Lithuania). After a good lunch, and a chance to network with the other delegates, Professor Anne Douglas (Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen) gave an ‘Invitation for Something to Happen’. She introduced the idea of co-creation/improvisation as a way of working with traditional culture, exploring a knitting project in Shetland. ‘The Maakin Lab’ www.maakinlab.org Velta Raudzep from The Museum of Decorative Arts, Riga brought delegates up to date on the shaping of Latvian identity in the 20th century and showing us examples from their collection. Finally Yvonn Dröge Wendle (Netherlands) presented a whirlwind tour of the world in search of the origins of red and white checked fabrics we know as Gingham. The Universal Pattern Project. www.universalpattern.nl reveals that it is indeed a universal pattern, popping up all over the world, in different colours, and each country claiming it as their own. The afternoon ended with the usual Q&A session and delegates were able to quiz artists, speakers and the curator. One of the questions directed at Lesley Millar was, after the success of this exhibition what was to be her next project? The answer – a project/collaboration between Norway and Japan. So hopefully we will have another great exhibition to look forward to. Lesley Millar’s research/exhibition has inspired experienced practitioners and students alike. They have done much to generate new interest in the art of textiles. Many willingly made the journey south to see these exhibitions, but it would be good to see them shown in Scotland. Perhaps with the new gallery spaces at Innovative Craft/Dovecot Studio we can attract these exhibitions north of the border? More information and exhibition images from ‘Cloth and Culture Now’ can be found at www.clothandculturenow.com 2009-01-26T17:17:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/patterns_are_everywhere_the_workshop/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/patterns_are_everywhere_the_workshop/#When:19:12:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: From the virtual to the practical.  After Liz’s latest blog on a novice’s response to podcasting, I can report on a novice’s response to a pattern making workshop, run on 13 January by Edinburgh ceramist Frances Priest. A capacity gathering of 20 artists, historians, curators and first timers began by handling a collection of the artists own incised, coloured, glazed ceramic samples followed by looking at a tiny drawing by Henry Moore of some garden plants, shown alongside samples of his abstract textile prints in the current exhibition. The first exercise allowed us to experience pattern through touch and the latter showed us, very succinctly, how an almost incidental sketch of a natural form could inform the designer’s eye when he went on to create the abstract pattern of the textile. We were then encouraged to hold this thought and go round the Jerwood Contemporary Makers show, looking at formal patterns that appeared to us, capturing our thoughts with drawing. When I was drawn to the work of jeweller Lin Cheung, Frances’ instruction to look quietly first for some minutes before making any marks was invaluable. Material that I knew well became richer through this exercise in considered looking, and I became fascinated by the ways in which Cheung had ordered her pendants;bowls; photographs to create lines and rows, rather like a textile pattern. Her total jewellery room suddenly slid into focus as not just as a rich exploration of the role of jewellery in our lives but as an exercise in visual perception using the elements of jewellery. After the drawing came the making and a wonderful hospital trolley full of coloured card; pastels; the inside of envelopes – those bank envelopes which have blue patterned interiors; chalks; scissors and glue were pounced on by workshoppers and a half hour of contented scribbling; cutting; gluing and ripping went on. Like a quilting bee each table also chatted on wider things with busy hands. Finally, the squares of patterned paper were laid down for general inspection and a sense of wonder prevailed.  Although partly one felt the extreme comfort of being looked after in a well planned workshop – a sort of regression to primary school as one participant expressed it – we all left thinking more deeply about the relationship between making and looking.  2009-01-16T19:12:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/hybrid_vigour_and_aid_for_technophobes/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/hybrid_vigour_and_aid_for_technophobes/#When:17:15:00Z {summary}Elizabeth Goring writes: IC’s New Year has got off to a great start! Despite the winter chill, Gary Breeze’s talk on Wednesday evening was our best attended ‘Thinking through Craft’ event so far (happily we’d brought in extra chairs) and it was good to see so many new faces. Gary’s presentation was absolutely excellent – thoughtful, inspiring, articulate and brilliantly illustrated. The question-and-answer session was particularly lively. Gary told us later it was probably the best audience response he’s ever had. Lots of really interesting issues were raised and we certainly plan to follow some of these up. The convivial quality of the evening spilled over into the galleries afterwards as Gary talked to people directly beside his stunning contribution to the Jerwood Contemporary Makers show. It was especially heartening to note the ever-increasing mix of people attending our events – amongst this particular audience I spotted architects, sculptors, calligraphers, curators, archaeologists, arts administrators, makers and collectors, as well as one of our youngest attendees so far. Building bridges between those involved in craft and other cultural areas, stimulating intelligent debate and providing opportunities for innovative creative development are among IC’s core aspirations. This coming together of people representing different perspectives and areas of expertise is therefore enormously exciting, and the wonderful Dovecot spaces are proving to be uniquely conducive to such dynamic interaction. If you missed Gary’s talk, or if you’d like to hear it again, there’s good news! Having done the equivalent of not reading the instruction manual at our first attempts, the technical expertise of Inner Ear’s very calm and patient Dougal Perman enabled us to record Gary’s presentation, and we’re turning it into a podcast which you will be able to download from our website in due course. For the less techie among us, Inner Ear’s website helpfully quotes dictionary.com’s definition: ‘A podcast is a web-based audio broadcast via an RSS feed, accessed by subscription over the Internet’. Inner Ear further explains that ‘A podcast is a series of media files distributed via an RSS feed. RSS (really simple syndication) is the XML-powered delivery mechanism for blogs, podcasts, photostreams, news feeds and social networking tools’. (Speaking for myself, I’ve yet to be convinced that any part of this is ‘really simple’; and I have no idea what an XML-powered delivery mechanism is, but I’m sure I’m absolutely alone in this.) Nevertheless, we’re planning to learn how to do this sort of thing completely fearlessly for ourselves – though at least two of us with perhaps a teeny amount of trepidation. Anyway, watch our website as we begin to stretch our about-to-be-newly-unfurled techie wings. In the meantime, nearly all the available places have been booked for Fran Priest’s intriguing participatory ‘Patterns are Everywhere’ event next week, so we may be looking at some ways of opening the event up to more participants. Do let us know if you want to come along. 2009-01-10T17:15:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/patterns_are_everywhere/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/patterns_are_everywhere/#When:19:44:00Z {summary}The title for Frances Priest’s workshop to be held here at Dovecot at 6.30pm on 13 January 2009* is a phrase that resonates with all of us at IC and Dovecot as we move forward from our frantic, fascinating, fast-paced activity of 2008. Everywhere around us there are intricate and arresting patterns to remember and enjoy. Douglas Grierson’s vibrant new tapestry, being cut off this week, is a brilliantly-patterned homage to the art of bathing – and a celebration of Dovecot Studios’ new swimming pool home. Four major exhibitions and one special display (Weaving Influences; Raising the Bar; One Eco Home furniture; Henry Moore Textiles; Jerwood Contemporary Makers) have all been launched in the Dovecot building in 2008, creating patterns of connection between diverse organisations such as Jerwood Charitable Foundation, Henry Moore Foundation and Ruthin Craft Centre and individual artists and designers from Scotland, Australia, Japan, Europe and America. The patterns of new technology are taking shape through the emerging IC website. These involve new recording equipment for launching our 2009 podcasts and the filmcraft project curated by Matt Hulse. The imaginative potential of creating real pattern through virtual means is explored through the work of young Scottish designer Drummond Masterton, whose CAD/CAM aluminium dishes have been dazzling viewers to Jerwood Contemporary Makers.  Nor are the patterns of old technology forgotten. In this age of new austerity we can enjoy the sustainable pattern of reanimating an old building using groundsource heating and hemp insulation and the sustainable creation of a superb, birchply display setbuild by Scottish sculptor Scott Laverie which we used for the displays in Raising the Bar in Edinburgh and in Wales. From February to May 2009 the exhibition, and Scott’s setbuild, will be shown in a third venue, at Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art. Simply designed and well constructed, the units show that craft is useful to the world of exhibition design as well as to the content.  New projects for 2009 include hosting the Age of Experience from Ruthin in May 2009. This is a superb celebration of established makers from the UK that shows the interconnected pattern of generations and includes new commissions from Caroline Broadhead alongside the eloquent patterns of the macrogauze hangings by the late Peter Collingwood, who sadly died earlier this year. There is also a rare chance to see a new collection from UK ceramist Elizabeth Fritsch in this exhibition. Fritsch’s poised, patterned forms are deeply inspired by her love, knowledge and practice of music.  Music is another potential pattern threaded through the IC/Dovecot activity. Young Scottish cellist Will Conway has been testing the acoustics; musical instrument maker and acoustic music composer Sarah Kenchington has been invited to created sound around stitch for the filmcraft weekend; and David Weir has kept tension at bay through rather effective riffs on the resident grand piano.  The lights are on in Princes Street, the Ferris wheel is turning and the Scott Monument stands stonily to attention over the skaters, the drinkers and the partygoers and another pattern occurs to me.  The pattern of unstinting, often unseen but unswervingly generous time given by my colleagues Roanne Dods and Elizabeth Goring at IC to help all these other patterns take shape. With thanks and see you all next year.  * Full details of this ‘drawing, making, looking’ evening can be found on our events page. 2008-12-18T19:44:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/autumn_winter_season_up_and_running/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/autumn_winter_season_up_and_running/#When:14:25:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: The IC/Dovecot autumn season is under way. Installation of Jerwood Contemporary Makers was achieved through a brilliant scratch combination of C’Art, Julia Ravenscroft from Jerwood, IC Directors and Joel Kaplan, our newly arrived Guggenheim-trained technician. Slightly too much time up 12-foot ladders but I think I have cracked the rather grand ERCO lighting system – only one exploding bulb so far. Press for the shows has included a slot on BBC Scotland Radio Café with Mark Crossan and a four-star review from Duncan MacMillan in The Scotsman. There’s been a good mix of visitors, including a group of eight- and nine-year olds from Queensferry Primary School, whose beautiful coloured drawings of the Nick Rena and Deirdre Nelson exhibits are inspiring and confirm the value of the show for all ages. IC has been joined for a few months by a new administrator Jenny Findlay and the IC office is suddenly showing signs of moving from chaotic adolescence to calm, filed, adult order.  ‘Thinking through Craft’, our new programme of talks and events for December/January, supported by the SAC, launches with Sara Brennan this Thursday and rolls through a lively season finishing with a grand finale of Matt Hulse’s FilmCraft weekend. See our Events page for details, or download a ‘Thinking through Craft’ leaflet. Scottish Opera singers and leading Scottish cellist Will Conway have been testing the acoustics. Anita Feldman gives a guided tour of Henry Moore Textiles this Friday and Dovecot, once again, is showing its colours as a great, creative melting pot for contemporary culture.  Come and join in! 2008-12-02T14:25:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/of_porcelain_and_pots/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/of_porcelain_and_pots/#When:10:11:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: Clare Twomey (www.claretwomey.com) installed her wall piece at Dovecot on Thursday and Friday. The shift of scale from Jerwood Space to Edinburgh has been fascinating – there is an elongated band of porcelain dust rather than a complete wall and subtler details of texture are already apparent. It will be interesting to see what Edinburgh hands make of it. Both Clare and I feel excited by the result. Also read her printed Conversations. Apparently we speak on average 9,000 words in an hour. This statistic haunts me – quite a sizeable essay being lost into the ether. Except she captured it. We plan to explore the spoken word in Edinburgh in December too. The Scottish potter Will Levi Marshall has been invited to talk about the work of the Edward Marshall Trust on 9 December: other ideas in the planning.  Meawhile, I contrasted, in my mind, Clare’s exploration of porcelain in space with a very different exploration by the older Australian artist Gwynn Hanssen Piggott. Having finally unpacked three beautiful bowls acquired from the recent Scottish Gallery show, I positioned them carefully under an attic window. I was rewarded this morning by brilliant winter sunlight lifting and animating each shade of white, creating a mesmerising symphony of tone. I found the following words written by Gwynn on the web (www.ceramicstoday.com): ‘Beauty, and our response to it, remains a mystery.But, it seems to me that, in the alchemy of making, the pot becomes subtly humanised. It is as though a kind of knowing – a history of understanding, and a sort of longing is translated, through care and consideration, and an intimate connecting with the stuff under our fingers…into a form with an independent life.  With its own power to move.’ Not a bad thought to carry forward as we install the rest of Jerwood Contemporary Makers. 2008-11-10T10:11:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/raising_the_bar_in_wales_and_another_exhibition_looms_in_edinburgh/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/raising_the_bar_in_wales_and_another_exhibition_looms_in_edinburgh/#When:11:59:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: Last weekend my colleague Elizabeth Goring and I dodged the Cumbrian rainstorms to drive down to North Wales for the installation and opening of Raising the Bar at the Gallery at Ruthin.  This, rather eccentrically, was my second visit to Wales in a week, as I had travelled to see the last day of the David Watkins jewellery show (discussed in the current issue of Crafts magazine) the weekend before at the same venue.  The Watkins show was an impressive survey of 40 years of studio practice and convincingly confirmed for me the role his work has played in creating a benchmark for innovative studio jewellery from the 1970s onwards.The show marked the publication of a major monograph by Beatriz Chadour Sampson, which creates something of a benchmark for publications in the field (Arnoldsche 2008).  During the afternoon of setting up Raising the Bar, S4C, the Welsh language arm of Channel 4, spent more than four hours filming the show and interviewing local Welsh speakers about their reaction to it (favourable, I am glad to say!).  It will be broadcast this Wednesday and we’re hoping to access a subtitled version in due course.  The new spaces at Ruthin are very beautiful.  For both visits the sun was shining in Wales and the Ruthin courtyard entrance, richly furnished with several variations of Jim Partridge and Liz Walmsleys’ seating designs casting shadows against the warm terracotta walls of the building, is very exciting and welcoming.  Partridge/Walmsley also designed the café furniture and the Reception desk. It’s a real delight to see craft as an embedded and substantial part of a new building, not an afterthought.  IC will be working with Jim and Liz on a new project for Edinburgh from next autumn – an exhibition and prototyping idea, which we hope will bear fruit in Spring 2010.  Back in Edinburgh the dust is subsiding, the Victorian steps have had a final coat of red paint and the Reception Area is floored and fitted. Next week’s delicately-balanced schedule begins with Clare Twomey painting one wall gold and spraying it with clay dust and is followed by an influx of objects, display stands, vinyl panels and assorted installation teams from both Jerwood, Henry Moore Foundation and IC/Dovecot.  By 14th November the new exhibitions will be open and we shall be beginning another journey with Innovative Craft.  We look forward to welcoming you back.  Please take a look at Past Events, ‘Raising the Bar’, where we have added some images of the Ruthin event to the Gallery. 2008-11-03T11:59:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/moving_into_autumn/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/moving_into_autumn/#When:15:47:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: Autumn has reached Edinburgh. Cold, but brilliantly sunny throwing the city architecture into sharp and extraordinary definition. All the summer exhibitions are dispatched following an exceptional final day on 27 September which saw 2,600 people flow through the doors at Dovecot in six hours. Weavers, invigilators, Directors and friends were all pressed into service to act as guides and helpers as our visitors patiently queued through all areas of the building. By the following Wednesday Dovecot had returned to its familiar status as a building site. Wisely, I left the all too dusty corridors for London, managing to visit both the Rothko and Bacon exhibitions. The late Rothko at Tate Modern was a revelation. The final room of Black and Grey paintings was emotionally powerful, magnetic and fascinating. Painting rarely gets better than this. A quick Italian trip also meant a chance to see the Piero della Francesca frescoes at Arezzo. There is something in the way this Renaissance master uses space that reminded me of the American modern master. A spatial clarity. You get it in great objects too. The Nick Rena exhibition currently at the Scottish Gallery demonstrates the same powerful quality: partly predicated on the balance between line, edge and void. That was also very striking in some of the Henry Moore sculptures we looked at in Indian summer sunshine this week after viewing the Textile show at Perry Green. It is exciting that we are showing Rena’s work in Jerwood Contemporary Makers later this month alongside the Henry Moore Textiles. Back at Dovecot we have taken delivery of a grand piano; a compressed air gun tufter and a great quantity of fine white dust. More muck than clarity at the moment but hopefully November will change all that. 2008-10-16T15:47:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/of_human_structures_and_other_collaborations/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/of_human_structures_and_other_collaborations/#When:10:25:00Z {summary}Amanda Game writes: I’m currently spending the hours between going to bed and sleeping (approximately 15 minutes per night) in reading the Charles Leadbeater book We-Think. In a month dominated by news of the failure, or temporary shutdown, of grand scale human structures (Large Hadron Collider; international capitalism), it is reassuring to read positive stories of human structures thriving courtesy of a more collaborative, communitarian approach. Structures, Leadbeater argues convincingly, at least by page 79, that are encouraged by the opportunities of virtual technologies. Mass innovation not mass production, as the book’s strapline has it. It’s interesting to consider the new Dovecot building in this light. In the past month we have welcomed groups of visitors from schools; German high finance; Scottish historical societies; our neighbours from Edinburgh Council and Edinburgh University; representatives of the Scottish business community, courtesy of the Art and Business reception last week and a group of specialist decorative arts curators from Shetland to East Kilbride. The latter group joined us today at a Scottish Arts Council-sponsored networking opportunity – it was very stimulating to hear of all the creative projects being quietly steered into existence to celebrate craft and design across the country. On Saturday we end the current crop of exhibitions (last to chance to see them!) with an active participation in Doors Open Day, the Cockburn Association-sponsored celebration of architecture here in Edinburgh. We are particularly delighted to be testing the acoustics of the Weaving Floor with a 53-strong Australian girls choir. It seems to me that mass collaboration is an active part of Dovecot – a fact that will be reflected yet again in our next pair of exhibitions, Henry Moore Textiles and Jerwood Contemporary Makers, which will open on 14 November. I think Charles Leadbeater might approve. 2008-09-23T10:25:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/a_glass_act_ics_inaugural_lecture/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/a_glass_act_ics_inaugural_lecture/#When:15:52:00Z {summary}We were delighted to host our inaugural lecture at Dovecot last week: Ann Wolff and Christopher Burns Transparencies – Glass in Architecture 4 September at the Dovecot Studios The South Gallery space was transformed through the addition of some simple corrugated paper blinds and some chairs hired from Andrew Wilson into a very practical, small lecture room. WarPro hired us the projection equipment and patiently set it up as we transferred the lectures from the artists’ sophisticated but incompatible laptops to my clearly very idiosyncratic old Sony which made all the architectural images look cropped. Some 30 attendees including glass makers, artists, architects and general visitors joined us for a glass of pink Prosecco and a very stimulating talk (see Alison McConachie’s comment below). The general buzz of conversation afterwards demonstrated the positive response to the talks, which combined confident presentation, clarity of thought and inspiring images. Thank you to all concerned. Alison McConachie writes: ‘These combined presentations gave a rare insight into an architect’s vision for a building as an ever-changing multi-layered 3D canvas and how this has created a dynamic living and working environment for the artist Ann Wolff. I have a great deal of respect for the many ways in which Ann Wolff uses glass in a most expressive way. I responded very much to what she said about the inherent beauty of glass and the need to go beyond what can be a barrier to make it work for you as a medium. I enjoyed her description of the ambiguity of glass and its ability to deceive the eye. She celebrated the versatility of glass, as compared with the canvas, as one can always go back to the previous layers that combine to create the whole picture. The cast works that she showed were lovely examples of her ability to capture the gestural movement of her instinctive drawings in a very natural way, drawing with line and form but also with the control of colour density through the varying thicknesses of the glass to great effect. Alison McConachie eca glass 2008-09-11T15:52:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/raising_the_bar_to_olympic_standards/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/raising_the_bar_to_olympic_standards/#When:16:26:00Z {summary}This was a comment made after a recent visit to the Dovecot shows by Scottish sculptor and metalworker Sam Wade. Positive comments like this, from a professional maker and artist, are incredibly encouraging. It feels as though we may be on the right track!  ‘Inspiring – both metal and tapestries’, wrote a recent visitor from the USA. ‘Great to see the building used for something beautiful and useful’, added a local, Edinburgh visitor. One of many delights since opening has been the steady influx of local residents who knew the Dovecot building well in its previous life as a swimming pool and seem to unanimously approve its rebirth as a gallery and tapestry studio. Critical comment has been strong too: Catriona Black in The Sunday Herald awarded Raising the Bar four stars, describing American exhibitor Myra Mimlitsch Gray’s work as ‘sensuous … the work of a great storyteller’. A recent comment piece in Crafts magazine by Corinne Julius says enthusiastically: ‘What Dovecot offers is a place for reflection and excitement, a type of space that’s been sorely lacking in the UK.’ Reaction to One Eco Home’s beautiful, sustainable furniture has been good too, with several direct sales and good orders. An immediate outcome has been the contact Helen Mudie of One Eco Home has made with new Scottish designers for her stable.  Don’t forget to go and look at their full product list at www.onecohome.co.uk.  Also any purchases of display items at Dovecot are subject to special discount – don’t miss the chance to visit, see and buy! We’ve had our second party here too, with the Scottish Arts Council’s annual gathering up of arts professionals here on 9 August and a special visit of international cultural attachés – projects from Venezuela to Japan are now in the planning.  The Olympics are over, but the international, Olympic standards remain here in Edinburgh! 2008-09-03T16:26:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/shared_common_knowledge_shines_through/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/shared_common_knowledge_shines_through/#When:17:15:00Z {summary}IC welcomes comment from Australian maker Robert Foster, whose own wonderful teapots in steel and aluminium have been wowing visitors to Raising the Bar. Robert travelled all the way from Australia to see and support the show in Edinburgh. He is a peripatetic guy at present, as his own design company Fink and Co. is subject of a major show opening in Washington, USA later this month. Robert writes: ‘Seeing the work out on display for the opening night of “Raising the Bar” was, and will remain, a strong and powerful memory to me. It looked impressive, a visually appetising array of objects. It was great seeing the exhibition three or four times, as well as spending some good times talking with colleagues. Each person’s work demonstrates a clear, enriched story that begins through shared common knowledge about making. What is amazing is how each of us has evolved our own personal expression – pushing through the boundaries of technique and developing deep into the nature of material. There is a great variety of exploration about the value of material, and the contemporary role the material plays and what makes it valuable, re-interpreting the notion of preciousness. ‘I really enjoyed the resolute and clear nature of a lot of the work, but was charmed by the camouflage of real skill and in-depth understanding that it took to make each piece convincing. It was great to be part of “Raising the Bar”. I hope the show will continue to educate public about the importance of crafts knowledge about supporting the growth and progression of mastering skill.’ 2008-09-01T17:15:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/what_follows_raising_the_bar/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/what_follows_raising_the_bar/#When:10:47:00Z {summary}We welcome guest writer Adam Paxon: I confess that my expectations for this exhibition were high. Amanda had shared much of her enthusiasm through the preparation stages. We had that day heard Richard Sennett’s lecture where amongst other gems he spoke about how he felt that we were currently culturally judged on what we consume rather than what we make, and of how the authority and importance of making was becoming lost. How interesting to move immediately, with reparation for lunch, from that experience to witness the work of twelve makers very much on their mettle. I recall being a little startled at the space afforded to this exhibition. Perhaps we have become too used to seeing craft work in somehow secondary, small and poorly lit spaces; an experience not endured by the more esteemed fine arts. This work very much benefited from being so confidently shown. The twelve bodies of work laid out on simple trestle tables, were mostly unclothed of their too familiar plastic shrouds, which so inhibit our touching of the work in all senses, and naked to the eye of the viewer. The only additional visual stimulus being 12 images of the makers, seductively unnamed. In this environment with little else to clutter the mind how easy it was to let yourself drift into the work. To take up the invitation to enter the worlds of these makers, share their enquiries, and marvel at their virtuosity. In all work presented the dextrous intelligence of the maker is very much in evidence. The pieces however, which remain most vividly in mind are the bowls of Rudolf Bott.  It seemed I could almost hear the sound of the production of these pieces. I felt prepared for the sudden and clamorous powerful ram, could almost smell lubricant, yet my eyes marvelled at their sensitivity. They have not been made by an engineer, who we more readily associate with these large-scale powerful industrial processes, but by a maker more governed by the slower speed and smaller scale of the hand; inquisitive, sensitive and delicate. This was an exhibition that raised many questions, and further fuelled ongoing discussions and debate.  It would appear that indeed the bar has been raised…what next? 2008-08-17T10:47:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/open_for_business/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/open_for_business/#When:17:04:00Z {summary}After the trials of last week, we’re now recovering our sanity – and we’re delighted with the warm reception our exhibitions are receiving. Contrast the frantic last-minute painting we showed in the last blog with the calmness of this photo taken in the Raising the Bar exhibition. Do drop in and see us! 2008-08-06T17:04:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/new_job_for_a_week/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/new_job_for_a_week/#When:16:44:00Z {summary}Last week involved an unusual career move. On Sunday 27 July, I was a Freelance Curator and Lead Director of IC. By Monday night I was honorary (in the sense of unpaid) Project Manager of an £ 8 million building site. Week plan: to arrive on Monday 28 July to instal two major exhibitions at Dovecot and to organise the Reception display area with One Eco Home. Beautiful objects and their artists had arrived from around the world. Text panels, set build, labels all ready and waiting. 400 guests had positively responded to the opening on 2 August. Week reality: Dovecot from Monday 28 July to Friday 1 August inclusive was a hard hat building site, with no front to one half of the building, filled with well over 100 workmen, awash with dust, mud, flailing wires, burst pipes and no lights. Somehow mid week we manage to convince all contractors that nothing mattered as much as getting this building open on time. Somehow throughout the week international artists exercised patience and nerve as their objects nestled in their packing amidst the chaos. Somehow we managed to get delivery of 300 light fittings and employ, at 24 hours notice, 6 professional fitters from Tower Productions to fit 300 lamps in them. Somehow we managed to call in emergency night security at 6 hours notice. Somehow a combination of weavers, friends, relatives and paid helpers became a professional installation team who, in 24 hours, installed 3 major spaces in hard hats and yellow high visibility vests: 80% of whom had never put up a shelf before. Somehow we got a Temporary Occupation Certificate at 5.25pm on Saturday 2 August and somehow, at 5.30pm the doors opened to the new exhibition spaces at Dovecot with three outstanding exhibitions, looking beautiful, professional and ready. From then on it was pink champagne, delighted guests and oblivion. This week I got my old job back. 2008-08-06T16:44:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/the_idle_and_industrious_prentice/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/the_idle_and_industrious_prentice/#When:10:01:00Z {summary}My home computer faces a set of Hogarth etchings: the Idle and Industrious ‘Prentice. Feel some sympathy with the last frame of the Idle Prentice as he goes on a cart, through chaos, to certain execution. Next two weeks will undoubtedly feel like this final journey through madness. Seems impossible that Infirmary Street will be ready. Blind faith, vodka and chocolate are the only way forward. Try to learn from the calm indifference of the house cat. Spend most daylight hours (which in Scotland at this time of year are of course almost continuous) in front of the computer, encouraging, hassling and cajoling to get people and objects in the same place at the same time. Feel that future generations will have specially adapted text/keyboard hands. Like the St Kildans who apparently developed prehensile toes for climbing up cliffs to catch gannets. Many objects have now arrived. Stunning Japanese work. The awe one feels in front of truly exceptional work. Remember why I do this. Spent the weekend catalogue proofing for Raising the Bar - fabulous design by Lisa at Lawn Creative in Liverpool - endlessly checking and re-checking text.  Think it will look great.  So, there will be a book. And an opening. Checking, re-checking invitation lists. Hope tomorrow that there may be glass and doors on the new building. See that the efficient Francesca from Dovecot has produced a wonderful task list for the next two weeks which includes the blissful words ‘25th July - Nuala cleans galleries.’ No idea who Nuala is, but I am indebted already. 2008-07-21T10:01:00+00:00 http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/the_challenge_of_a_brand_new_exhibition_space/ http://www.innovativecraft.co.uk/index.php/about/ic_blog_entry/the_challenge_of_a_brand_new_exhibition_space/#When:10:34:00Z {summary}Now less than a month to go until the new Dovecot spaces open in Edinburgh and IC:Innovative Craft finally has a proper home. The floor tiles were being installed last week and are looking good!  The shade of paint that was agreed, Ice Mountain, looks perfect as a flexible hanging surface. The two exhibitions of international contemporary metal and Dovecot tapestries are shaping up well. Set build and graphic design for both shows is well underway and the final list of works is looking very strong. This new building has such potential as an exhibition space - an astonishing 6600 square feet of it, right in the heart of Edinburgh’s Old Town. It is professionally exciting, and challenging, to have the responsibility for creating the launch events and exhibitions with David Weir of Dovecot Studios. For me, it’s a new experience to be starting with such a blank canvas before an exhibition. All those years of exhibition organising at the Scottish Gallery and I knew the spaces and how they worked intimately. As the Dovecot spaces are only going to be revealed, fully, at the moment of installation, a degree of intelligent guess work is required. Also, how all the visitors will actually circulate in the space will only be apparent on the day! At this stage in exhibition preparation I am immersed in the endless detail of practical delivery (transport, insurance, staffing etc) while trying to keep sight of the final vision of the installed exhibitions. The plans for the Reception Area are also going well, with a great list of furniture coming from One Eco Home – all pieces which demonstrate good sustainable design credentials. Invitations now printed; catalogues at the designers; opening party planned. Each day more things ticked off and more (usually more) added. Eight of the 12 international makers from Raising the Bar are going to be at the opening which is fantastic news, except I must now find them all accommodation during the International Festival… Amanda Game, Lead Director, IC:Innovative Craft. 2008-07-10T10:34:00+00:00