John Ruskin and the "Lamp of Life"

A day or two after my last post, I discovered an excerpt from the writings of John Ruskin which summarised eloquently something of my own feeling about the work of creating:

"I believe the right question to ask, respecting all ornament, is simply this: Was it done with enjoyment - was the carver happy while he went about it? It may be the hardest work possible, and the harder because so much pleasure was taken in it; but it must have been happy too, or it will not be living." (p61-2)

The quote above comes from Ruskin's "The Seven Lamps of Architecture". Ruskin was an English art, architectural and social critic whose later inspired for William Morris, instigator of the Arts and Crafts Movement. The Arts and Crafts Movement reacted against machine forms and overly-ornate decoration, developing instead an aesthetic of simple, functional beauty in art, architecture and furniture design.

In a section entitled "'The Lamp of Life': Hand and heart for work of art", Ruskin goes on to say:

"...all the short, and cheap, and easy ways of doing that whose difficulty is its honour - are just so many new obstacles in our already encumbered road. They will not make us happier or wiser - they will neither extend the pride of judgment nor the privilege of enjoyment. They will only make us shallower in our understandings, colder in our hearts and feebler in our wits. And most justly. For we are not sent into this world to do anything into which we cannot put our hearts." (p63)

That does seem to me to be a pretty tough call. And one that it's easy enough to shoot holes in by pointing out that in our society, it's only the privileged who have the luxury of choosing the work we find most dignified, the work we can pour our hearts into. But I would suggest that the quest for cheapness and imitation is fuelled by the privileged, anyhow - the rich imitating the richer - and factory labourers producing imitation wood and stone surfaces are victims of a society in which the agenda has been set for them. That society has lost its connection to real things.

I can't say I follow Ruskin entirely - it isn't clear to me why he condemns wrought iron but lauds tile mosaics, for example. I imagine he is a man of his time, and wonder whether people may look back on my own preference for "natural" over "synthetic" fibre as a quaint anachronism. But I think we need to rethink our production agenda, and that part of that rethinking needs to be weighed against the dignity of the work we expect people to perform.

It is no surprise that the inherent "dignity" of a given form of work takes second place to getting bread on the table. But I hope that one day that dignity may be available to all, not only in "art" or the "high" professions; that we may feed, clothe and shelter ourselves through such dignified and difficult work. Then the love of the artisan will be found in the bread, the table, and the shirt on the back of she who eats.

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Ruskin, John 1849. "The Seven Lamps of Architecture" in W. G. Collingwood (ed), 1907. The Ruskin Reader, 49-69. Ballantyne Press: London.

If You Can't Love It, Don't Make It - some thoughts on care

It's a hard ask, especially if your craft is your living. Granny Funk was at the Wanneroo Art "N" About Markets recently, and in the lead-up there was the inevitable rush to get stock made in between the organisational scrambles that seem to make up a great deal of life. At the best of times, creating a piece of art of any sort is a pleasure. Giving my full attention to what I'm doing, thinking about what the best thing to do next will be - change colour? A button? A virtuoso pattern variation? - and letting the piece emerge with its own character. But creative enterprises are not immune to the stresses of time demands. And when time stress replaces attention and delight, the thing dies. Oh, you might make something wonderful - but if you don't love it while you make it, you probably won't love it afterwards, even if someone else does. And if you're an artist, that's not really how you want to feel about your work.

I think it's the case that the emphasis on efficiency in our industrial economy has marginalised care as a benchmark against which the quality of work is measured. We can make a lot of things very quickly, and perhaps structurally soundly, too - but can we make them well? By what measure would we consider something well-made? Does it make a difference if something has been made by hand or by a machine in China? And if it does, what kind of difference? Is quality an exclusively technical measure (e.g. durability of a garment or accuracy of joinery in a piece of furniture), or does "quality" indicate something beyond the sum of technical measurements, something less measurable? Do we set some stock on care as well as on productivity?

Given the trend toward all things handmade, it would seem that increasingly, yes we do. But is this growing emphasis on handmade items a real appreciation for quality artistry, or is "handmade" simply becoming a selling catch-word as part of our quest for "authentic" buying experiences, regardless of the actual conditions of production? I want to believe that the current trend in fashion toward retro, vintage and handmade items is at least partially underpinned by a growing awareness that we need to recycle things; that there is quite a lot of fabric on the planet already; that a sweatshop-import economy is not morally or environmentally viable. And that - oh please! - if we are to survive the inevitable shifts that peak oil is going to mean for our society, we are going to need to start learning to do some things with our hands again. And learn to love the work we have palmed off.

Unfortunately I feel a little concerned that this may be, indeed, just another fad. And I am aware that, as with other fads with apparently good credentials, there is a lot of hyper-consumption going on. But I hope that in amongst that consumption the conversation about what we value and what constitutes quality can start in earnest, and that "handmade" can be valued in its connection to a just and environmentally sound future more than its trend-factor.

I do think there is a difference made by care - a difference which becomes visible in product and practice. When I get tired of crocheting, I repeat my little mantra, and I find a way to love it again.