ECC2018 Talks

ECC2018 Talks

Bornholm was recently given the honorable title of first World Craft Region in Europe, by the the World Crafts Council. To selebrate the islands new identity as World Crafts Region, ECC2018 is organizing a series of studio visits & artist talks, held in selected ceramic workshops on Bornholm. This format replaces the traditional conference. Instead, selected Bornholm workshops will host guest artists and curators in artist talks and conversations to investigate and uncover the current discussions of crafts, art and industry in the field of ceramics, artistic development and theory. 

CRAFT ART AS POLITICAL AND CULTURAL CAPITAL

By virtue of Bornholm’s prominent new title as the first ‘World Craft Region’ in the world, the island has indeed gained momentum as a craft art region. Craft art has become a marketable business, thus spurring the growth of the island’s craft art environment. The talk highlighting some of the potential and dilemmas for new joint ventures and partnerships. It highlights which opportunities and challenges are there when production goes from unique to series production, and which dilemmas arise in relation to identity of local production, ethics and environmental challenges.

Bornholm has always had a foresighted craft-art industry exemplified by the successes of Hasle Klinker and Hjorths Fabrik in Denmark and abroad. Bornholm’s current endeavours are steeped in the history of applied arts – infused with the dynamism of passionate pioneers and skilled creators – which also constitutes the foundation of the innovative, political and cultural visions aimed at propelling Bornholm into the 21st century as a potent business and brand.

Speakers
Anne Thomas, civil engineer and Deputy Mayor of Bornholm, the Alternative Party
Craft art as a political agenda, as well as a commercial and financial growth factor 

Sarah Oakman, Ceramist, Oh Oak
About the interconnection between gourmet and craft art and about business cooperation projects 

Rebecca Uth, designer and founder of RO 

CRAFT ART AS A SOCIETAL MIRROR AND OPINIONATOR
Crafts as an art is no new phenomenon. One-of-a-kind craft art has always existed as a special discipline in the field. The new element, however, is found in the meta-layers we are increasingly beginning to see in these works, such as a conceptual framework from which the works emanate, or a title suggesting one or more points in the work. It can also be historical baggage interwoven with the mode of expression, enhancing the value of the work and enshrining it in a new historical context. 

 We are familiar with this method of integrating meta levels from the visual arts, as we witness the current erosion of hierarchies the more we sample from one another: pieces of furniture balancing on the edge of art, jewellery worn as storytelling sculptures, or clothes skewering a political debate on gender roles. The development of the one-off genre is interesting. Combining competent, refined and seasoned craft art with a conceptual, artistic or political agenda creates objects that impact, affect and influence us at deeper meaningful levels. 

Speakers
Alexander Tallén, Ceramic Artist, Sweden
Tallén's artistic practice touches upon questions such as exotification, gender and identity.

Karen Lisa Salamon, Anthropologist, PhD and mag.scient., researcher, writer 

Maciej Kasperski, ceramic artist, Poland 
Kasperski's work focusses on functionality, craftsmanship and the objects in relation to the body.

THE POETRY OF THE MATERIAL – TACIT KNOWLEDGE AND WISE HANDS 
Most of us have experienced it before. The game of Chinese whispers where you whisper something into the ear of the next person in line who passes it on to the next, and so on. Where the original message becomes totally different as it transforms through the whisperers along the way. The exhibition at the Charlotte Thorup Gallery evokes this game through its title ‘China Whispers’. Thorup tells a bit about the idea itself and why it is interesting to ask different ceramists to interpret the ‘same’ word. 

The point of departure for the exhibition and this talk is the material and its inherent potential if you have wise hands. Wise hands, because the craft artist has been working with the material for years and is intimately familiar with his or her style and techniques and the unique properties of the material. Because how does the poetry of the material arise? An experience familiar to all of us when materiality, aesthetics and competent craft art converge in a joyous entity. How can one’s love affair with a material be perpetuated? By continuing to develop it? By transcending its limits and exploring its potential? That is the focal point of this talk where we go physically on board in the material and works at the exhibition ‘China Whispers’ and hear some of the artists’ underlying ideas and thoughts. Because how can tacit knowledge be articulated so that it makes sense to anyone else but the practitioners?

Speakers
Charlotte Thorup, Ceramic Artist, Bornholm, Denmark

Monika Patuszyńska, Ceramic Artist, Poland and part of the ECC2018 Artist in Residence Programme

Karen Lisa Salamon, Anthropologist, PhD and mag.scient., researcher, writer