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Voices
Voices
Do you think of yourself as belonging to a crafts community?
Absolutely. I write about craft, collect contemporary craft 
and antiques, socialize with craft artists and collectors, take workshops in metal, fibers or clay, and lecture on the history of craft. I am more a "thinker" than a "maker" (in the words of John Ruskin) when it comes to craft: my current passion is drawing connections between the Arts and Crafts movement and today's green design/sustainability movement. But it 
is the crafts community-artists, collectors, curators, students and scholars-that sustains me. -Beverly K. Brandt, professor, School of Design Innovation, 
Arizona State University, Tempe I am so completely on the fence between two ...
 
Voices
How Important Has Mentorship Been to You?
Early on in my career I remember asking a fellow writer how he did artist profiles so quickly-we were writing for a weekly arts publication with a heavy workload and short turnaround. He replied, "Quick and dirty! It's not brain surgery!" Not helpful. Most of the mentors I've had in my 25 years of professional writing have been the people I've interviewed, whose lives and art have engaged me so that I've wanted to hone my skills to share their stories.-Gussie Fauntleroy, writer, Crestone, CO I am fortunate to be a mentor and to have been mentored by others. During ...
 
Voices
Question: How are you coping with the economic downturn?
We are finding that people place a high priority on education in time of recession. Our 12-week and 9-month courses are running at full capacity, and the shorter summer workshops are down only slightly against last year. We seem to be weathering the storm in relative safety.­—Peter Korn, executive director, Center for Furniture Craftsmanship, Rockport, Maine We are continuing to show only the very best work, and we have not curtailed our rather ambitious exhibition schedule. We’ve been through economic downturns before and this one, though it has felt somewhat deeper, now seems to be turning around. San Francisco ...
 
Voices
Question: What aspect of your work do you find the most difficult?
The most difficult part is coming up with new designs. I’m always contemplating how a shape will come out and striving for something different. Traditional forms were passed down to me from my ancestors, and I wanted to introduce my own designs that no one had ever done before. So this has always been a challenge for me.­—Mary Jackson, sweetgrass basket weaver, Charleston, SC I’m working on a project that requires reading interviews and oral histories. In the past, I have conducted many interviews and a number of oral histories with artists, and reading others at this task reminds me ...
 
Voices
Question: What’s the most exciting show you’ve seen lately?
Paul Chan’s exhibition “My laws are my whores,” at the Renaissance Society, University of Chicago, perhaps because it countered my expectations. I’d seen Chan’s work a few times, and I was expecting an incredibly visual, somewhat poetic exhibition. Portraits of Supreme Court justices greeted viewers at the Ren, high on the entrance wall, and on the other side of the wall was a projection of vibrating naked bodies in sexual and tortuous postures. It was a tough show, formally commanding and disturbing in a thought-provoking way. ­—Anne Wilson, artist, professor at the School of the Art Institute ...
 
Voices
Question: What’s the most memorable exhibition opening you’ve ever attended?
I traveled to Chicago in July 2004 with my 12-year-old son, and we stumbled upon the opening day of Millennium Park. The place was jammed with humanity. The two main public sculptures—Anish Kapoor’s Cloud Gate and Jaume Plensa’s Crown Fountain—were being loved to death by hordes of enthusiastic kids, teens and adults. Kapoor’s sculpture was mostly polished, but a lot of exposed welds were still rough, so I got a sense of how much work went into generating the soon-to-be-seamless form. At the Plensa fountain, businessmen were taking off their shoes and wading in the water. Both pieces are models ...
 
Voices
What effect has the Internet had on your work or career?
While I have a website, I don't have high expectations of sales from it. Having a site, driving traffic to it and selling through it are different tasks. I find its cachet of professionalism useful. The Internet also offers me immediate information and communication. My use of it for my business has diminished during my tenure as president of the Furniture Society, but it has grown by an order of magnitude in my daily work schedule. I'd be lost without it. ...