np status

...loose words knotted themselves to asphixiation !!!!!!!!!

Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec - site quoting" "

"We’ve never manufactured anything ourselves. As far as we’re concerned, design is a two-handed business, in which we do the designing and someone else does the manufacturing.

Department stores "For a company, selling is the final stage in the processing of an object. As the ultimate goal, it does a certain amount to inform the project as it develops. We’re concerned with this question, and at the same time it’s physically distanced from us. Once the project has passed the last stage of its development, companies take responsibility for commercialization. For some, like Habitat who sell through their own chain of stores, the context is quite clear, while for others, like Teracrea, distribution is based on department stores that are often characterized by their diversity. In spite of everything, throughout the whole of the project, we pay a lot of attention to the issues of commercialization. Often simple rules are laid down, connected, for example, to ease of storage. Sometimes, through a more elaborate scenario, and our efforts to understand and respond to the wants and desires of consumers, a project can evolve into a truly useful solution.

"We draw on sketch pads, or pile up sheets of paper. We work on several projects at the same time, some only in their initial stages, others being retouched for the last time.
A sketch can have any scale that you wish to give it. Often, as you run through a sketch pad, a line may represent one centimetre of a piece of plastic, then on the following page it can signify one metre of a piece of polystyrene. The sketchbook is the collection of different work contexts, from industry to craft, large-scale to small. And so, from one page to the next, one drawing simply guided by the hand can evolve from a piece in polystyrene to a well-crafted jewel.
The polystyrene « Clouds » and the jewels are both born of the same logic: they are the proliferation of a shared abstract form, like a growing plant, stubbornly repeating its structure of nodes. The clouds are designed to grow in an architectural space. Jewels rest on the skin.
The project of a wall for a shelter is based on the multiplication of a tiny three-dimensional motif. This piece, which resembles a small branch, is injected in polypropylene. Simply, with different colours and various alternate connections, we have managed to create an irregular skin. In this instance the repetition generates a certain visual complexity."

"We’re interested in beauty. It’s a complex subject: to forget about function, to produce an object solely for the eye. A still life.
The still life is built in two dimensions. First of all it is based on formal qualities of proportions and colours. Secondly, it works through more cultural, symbolic referents. The doubt lies in reaching a finished image.

Sounds, lights (Bruits et lumières) "Both sound and light have this special quality of being impalpable, of having no visual essence. They are purely ‘temporal’ in the sense that they leave no trace of their passing. We are delineating components, emitters of light and sound, whose forms are essentially technical. Therefore we design a shell whose shape has to evoke an energy that it cannot contain. In this respect, a logic based on forms following functions (like a jug handle) goes out of the window. Perhaps we should start with the « Parlo »: a trophy designed as the image of a victory that you must often conclude with a speech. Indeed, it is about giving a shape to something that is merely a recognition, trying to create an object that provokes a certain exuberance. This megaphone – being but a fascimile – is lined with felt like a piece of Hermès leatherwork.

Situations "A situation is played out just as much in accordance with our mood as with our material surroundings. Sometimes our work is concentrated more specifically around the attention that we pay to the user. On the one hand an object is guided by its functionality, on the other, its typology often contains certain rituals and habits. Often the mere suggestion or accentuation of a prehensile quality, or the use of a material charged with history, allows us to go beyond a functional situation in order to attain a kind of savoir-vivre. ... This chapter doesn’t discuss multifunction. Rather it tries to evoke the way in which hand and body balance between the functionality of tool use and more sensitive reactions, linked to culture.

A monochrome "Traditionally, the materials of the objects surrounding us are chosen and organized around their ability to respond to particular needs. It’s often a fairly complex matter to find a single material that is capable of responding to all the requirements of the object. We have designed pieces in such a way that they are monochrome, their visible material is plain. Choosing uniformity makes the object simpler for the eye and erases the details. Strangely, this has the effect of rendering it all the more undefined. ... Thus everything is unified, the table with the vase, the mirror with the console.
Monochrome is a way of connecting uses and different limitations, linking both the technological and the habitual.

Skin (De la peau) "Skin is the surface of the object.
While the materials around us are becoming increasingly standardized and finishes are becoming more and more uniform, work on skin strikes us as being of prime importance. It allows you to intrigue the eye, making the perception of an object stranger than it would be if you were able to read its form and material in a simple manner. We’re not particularly interested in decor. We were rather thrown by Sommer’s proposition: to create a motif for carpet tiles, 50 x 50 cm, to cover a floor. Certainly the result is formal, but this sequence of lines, when the pieces are placed together, causes the boundaries between the carpet tiles to disappear and the effect somewhat resembles a chess board. Here, skin serves to coalesce, to unify.
It’s almost the same game with the project for the dinner service for the Prefecture of Strasbourg. It concerns how one connects different objects that are, moreover, made up of different materials.
And then there’s the mirror, a reflection-object."

Assembly (Un montage) "Being able to assemble pieces yourself often means being able to make decisions, to assess your real needs.
Primarily we’re interested in ease of assembly because it forms the basis of the future of an industrial project. For a set of shelves, for example, this is fundamental in terms of the logistics of manufacturing and distribution. This ease of assembly, along with modularity, opens up an area of autonomy for the user, which isn’t there with pieces that are complicated to build. Simplicity of construction forces you to go back to simple gestures, to common sense, to a universal skill.

Walls and roof (Des murs, un toît) "Taking the « Lit Clos » bed and the « Disintegrated Kitchen » as our starting-point, we embarked upon research in which we increased the traditional scale of furniture .
This research is primarily articulated around the formation of walls and, more generally, around those elements that structure the space. While the bed and the kitchen were still more specifically function-based projects, we gradually found ourselves coming closer to more indistinct designs relating to walls and roofs. Work on this scale actually implies a certain restraint. We are very critical of proposals that attempt to cover all the functions of a given situation.
These projects just try to create sensitive boundaries: being beside, behind, below. They aim to give the space a feeling, a direction, to make the user more sensitive to a particular place. And so the function of these places don’t belong to us.
The « Parasol Lumineux » lamp attracts people just as a hearth does when you walk into a home. The feeling of finding yourself below a roof, which is itself below a ceiling, attracts and brings people a greater intimacy. The space is created by an immaterial context, connected with that sense of ‘being below’.
The « Cabane » simply defines a perimeter, and thus an inside and outside, because it escapes typologies suggesting a particular use, returning to the simple idea of the boundary.
Our technical culture isn’t the same as that of architects. In these designs we’ve transferred a skill connected with furniture-making, in that we’re using ‘light’ techniques. Light, when you bear in mind that after all a sofa arrives complete, in a cardboard box. Light because they don’t require a particular skill on the part of the user, unlike the more traditional materials and machinery of building work. Ease of assembly is fundamental, giving the user a certain autonomy, even on this scale.
As to the « Clouds », the « Suspended Trellis », the « Cabane », it may be that our work operates on the level of a series of motifs, on the creation of various different motifs for the domestic environment. It is a simple reaction against the tendency towards uniformity in the quality of the walls, floors and roofs that surround us.
Following this path has led us to a complete yet floating house. So it remains an unanchored object, it could be located elsewhere. "

North Tiles (Les Tuiles) The Kvadrat showroom is structured by textile walls made of independant « Tiles » assembled together via an ingenious folding system.

The North Tiles sytem was conceived specifically for the textile showroom activity. It aims at highlighting the various textures and materials of Kvadrat’s collection by dressing the spot with sensuality and warmth.

Moreover, it grants a certain flexibility and a wide range of possible evolution to the showroom. The extreme easiness of the pieces’ assembling to build walls leaves Kvadrat free of changing the configuration and the atmosphere of the place.
Then, the doors themselves are conceived as self-supporting and mobile modules like « furniture-boxes » that can be moved easily. Accesses, corridors and transitions can be changed, thus making the general architecture of the space fully evolutive.

But the North Tiles system is also a new way of building walls with independant modules in the tradition of Algues and Twigs. It is the realisation of some long-incubated ideas about constructing soundproofing spaces with textile.
Conceived like sorts of scales, the North Tiles can follow infinite shapes, be they organic or geometric. Thus, the high modularity of this system allows to consider multiple applications in order to build autonomous and soundproofing spaces.

The industrialization process of the tiles is surprisingly easy and fast : 20 seconds only are needed to mould the hard foam core between 2 pieces of material. With the assembling simplicity of the tiles, anyone can consider creating variable-geometric surfaces, building walls with a soft and rythmical aesthetics and thus creating astoning places with a muffled atmosphere.

www.bouroullec.com

>>

>>

>>

>>

>>

>>

>>

>>

FELT by Willow Mullins

From nomads' tents to poodle skirts, from car parts to Christmas tree ornaments, felt is one of the world's oldest and most understated textiles. Felt has developed simultaneously in multiple cultures, and often its origins are lost. However, far from having been supplanted by new fabrics, not only has felt retained its traditional uses among peoples around the world, but it has also seen a revival of popularity among today's hand feltmakers, craftspeople and fashion designers. This book follows the journey of felt through time, space, and purpose by pulling into focus a series of snapshots of different felting traditions.

Beautifully illustrated, Felt covers the wide-ranging history and development of this most unassuming but ubiquitous of fabrics from the earliest archaeological evidence in the mountains of Siberia to the groundbreaking works of contemporary fiber arts and sculptors.

About the author

Willow G. Mullins received her BA in Folklore from Brown University and her MS in Textile History and Conservation from the University of Rhode Island. She has worked as a textile conservator, and is now working on her PhD in Folklore at the University of Missouri, Columbia with an emphasis on material and visual culture and postcolonial theory. Her current research interests include the embodiment and representation of personal and cultural identities, intercultural interaction, and the ethics of representation and global aid.

Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter 1 – The History of Felt
Chapter 2 – The Making of Felt
Chapter 3 – Felt in Central Asia
Chapter 4 – Felt in the Middle East, Turkey and Hungary
Chapter 5 – Felt in Europe
Chapter 6 – Felt in Western Art
Chapter 7 – Felt Everywhere
Chapter 8 – The Meanings of Felt
Bibliography

FELT

felt1 (fĕlt)
n.
1.
1. A fabric of matted, compressed animal fibers, such as wool or fur, sometimes mixed with vegetable or synthetic fibers.
2. A material resembling this fabric.
2. Something made of this fabric.

adj.
Made of, relating to, or resembling felt.

v., felt·ed, felt·ing, felts.v.tr.
1. To make into felt.
2. To cover with felt.
3. To press or mat (something) together.

v.intr.
To become like felt; mat together.

felty felt'y adj.
felt2 (fĕlt)
v.
Past tense and past participle of feel.

Excerpts of Kevin Murray lecture on Object of Labor publication

Taken from CraftCulture.org

Lecture to the Chicago Institute of Art 3 October 2007 as part of a series associated with the Object of Labor publication by Kevin Murray

. . . Rather than learning to make things ourselves, we have taken the ‘smart' option of outsourcing those specialised tasks to a largely invisible working class in Asia.
. . .

What's left to Western countries like Australia and the US are the information industries, such as design, entertainment and business. These enable much greater interconnectivity than the specialisations required in manufacturing. However, this is only possible in the context of a greater global specialisation whereby whole countries are dedicated to particular kinds of production.
. . .

Collaboration does represent an important frontier of craft production, as western artists and designers are increasingly commissioning work from traditional artisans. This genre of world craft certainly has its dangers, as it lends itself to a kind of exoticism that does not seriously value the contribution of makers. However, world craft does have the potential to sustain traditions and cultures. The challenge now is to strengthen this emergent genre with critical examination. To be sustained beyond fashion it needs to deal with the spectres of primitivism and missionary values. If it can proof itself to be a genuinely liberating practice, then world craft augers well for constructive dialogue between first and third worlds. This will not happen spontaneously. It requires much care and critical self-reflection.

Kevin Murray is Director of Craft Victoria (see personal website for more information)
http://www.craftculture.org/Archive/kmurray6.htm

Bruno Latour: We Have Never Been Modern

Taken from CraftCulture.org written by Robert Cook

---

We have never been modern is the first of Latour's books that I have read. While familiar with the name, and possessing a working knowledge of where his practice is located – somewhere around and between science studies, the philosophy of science, anthropology and sociology (the indeterminateness of this is, in part, the subject of his book)—he was outside the glamorous mainstream of French thought as it filtered through backwoods like Australia. Given that Latour is mostly antagonistic to what we know as French structural and post-structural philosophy (who he argues, rightly, has been too rigidly focused on the social in isolation from the material), it is no surprise he was not widely popular when our Antipodean embrace of French thinking's meaning over matter shtick was at its apogee. It was, therefore, in the spirit of belated intellectual expansiveness that I tackled this short book. It definitely won't be the last I read of his work.

But when I say tackled , I mean it: it was a struggle; this book was incredibly difficult to read. Ten pages per sitting was more than enough. This was not to do with unnecessarily dense or abstruse prose, but because of the originality (to me) of his argument and its formal structure. Within these pages is evidence of a mind who is re-thinking our orthodox assumptions of modernity and all that goes along with that (and there is so much). And this re-thinking kept gathering mass and momentum like a snowball barreling down an Alpine peak. As such, there were no moments to breathe and take in the view, to recap. Nonetheless, the mass and force of Latour's words—that feels, appropriately, like physics made literary—adds up to a fine rhetorical essay style1. There were times when it felt like it was a highly intellectual version of spoken word poetry. And its velocity was taking me places I hadn't thought possible. That was precisely its difficulty for me, that of so rapidly shedding assumptions...one after the other, the lines of narrative that we in the arts use as lazy shorthand each and every day of our working lives were being turned over and around.

The title is jolt enough: We have never been modern. Latour gets to that radical statement with a reflection on the condition of his own profession – ‘whatever label we use, we are always attempting to retie the Gordian knot by crisscrossing, as often as we have to, the divide that separates exact knowledge and the exercise of power – let us say nature and culture' (Latour 1993: 3). It is a form of science-studies that does more than simply socially contextualise science, or ‘sciencify' social forces. By focusing on the notion of networks, it seeks to move in and out and across all disciplines to discover their interconnectedness. Yet there is something in the way that our modern constitution has been devised that makes this forever difficult: it is because we have separated out nature and culture. The worlds of the laboratory and the worlds of ideology are fundamentally divided. This divide is the basis for our modernity.

To examine this idea, and its historical roots, Latour looks at Shapin and Schaffer's (1985) study of Thomas Hobbes and Robert Boyle's mid-seventeenth century constructions of science and politics. For verification of what was a scientific fact, Hobbes appealed to a single, abstract, social power, while Boyle appealed to observation of natural events (as fashioned in the lab). This difference was the basis for a split between the social and the natural that formed the base of modernity. Importantly for Latour, Shapin and Schaffer hone in on the significance of Boyle's air-pump apparatus within this separation, noting that social truth is actually indivisible from the material basis of scientific experimentation. From this Latour is able to argue that the separation of nature and culture, is a fiction, that there exist many quasi-objects and hybrids that sit between both, it is just that we have so defined our world as to delimit any real view of them. As he writes: ‘As soon as one outlines the symmetrical space and thereby re-establishes the common understanding that organizes the separation of natural and political powers, one ceases to be modern' (Latour 1993: 13).

The realization of this has many effects, one of which is to allow is for anthropology to ‘come back from the tropics', and start its work on ourselves. It is to see the networks that tie the natural and the cultural together. This is no mere professional border expansionism though. Instead, it is about how we currently live—indifferent to nature (because we are somehow above it), caught in the endgames of post modern disenchantment, and the left-over compulsion to push forward with avant-garde novelties as we wait for the next big thing that will bind us and give our lives and cultural practices meaning.

This is, of course, the most glib of summaries, missing all the compelling nuances of Latour's vision and program. It must stand as shorthand, however, so we can at least touch on the obvious question within this journal: how might Latour's propositions apply to craft? Very, very generally, it could be that by employing a kind of complex anthropology—instead of the usual bright and eager journalistic boosterism that dominates most writing and that fails to consider the real connections between stuff and context—we might start to see how craft functions as a hybrid object between nature and culture. Through this we might determine the ways that craft itself has never been modern, that it has always been at the cusp of the undoing of the modern, and at the start of something else; it is just that our idea of what constitutes the modern is prey to the blind-spots that the separation of nature and culture have caused, so we have never even noticed this. Or if we have intuited it, we have not understood its potentially radical significance2. Indeed, the fact that craft deals with matter and its possibilities and limits in a sometimes tense relationship to the exhibition context (dominated by art and its own ways of negotiating the nature-culture divide) may make it the ideal case-study for anyone wanting to push Latour's ideas by analyzing the ‘exact knowledge' of the studio in concert with the ideologies of the exhibition space and market-place and literary discourse.

It is quite possible that these ideas have already been the subject of several dozen PhDs already. Yet even if this is the case, they have not managed to make their way to our broader consciousness, which is why Latour seems so difficult; we are used to bracketing off the material from the ideological, even in the practices that most bring them together. What Latour offers, therefore, is the possibility of a new language and new techniques of inquiry to guide and bring together making and thinking. Who knows maybe this language may make craft writing relevant to makers, as well as make making relevant to thinkers, from a range of fields. It will not be easy, but it is (coincidentally?) perfectly in-keeping with what this journal is about.

Notes

1The reason for this might be explained when he writes ‘Nietzsche said that the big problems were like cold baths: you have to get out as fast as you got in' (Latour 1993: 12)

2Perhaps this is more the case. Broadly, craft writing has not struggled to move from matter to ideology, but has found it hard to move back again and complete the circle in any rigorous way. This is because the social pole is still the most valued. You can almost feel the relief when the studio is left behind for the peaks of interpretative speculation and discursive contextualisation. I am as guilty of this approach as anyone.

References

Bruno Latour We Have Never Been Modern (translated by Catherine Porter) Harvard University Press: Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1993

Shapin, Steven and Schaffer, Simon Leviathan and the Air-Pump: Hobbes, Boyle and the experimental life , Princeton University Press: Princeton, New Jersey, 1985

Robert Cook is Associate Curator of Contemporary Art, Art Gallery of Western Australia

http://www.craftculture.org/Archive/rcook1.htm