should craft matter?

Should craft matter? In the age of maufactured obsolescence when products are designed to be discarded in six months or a year, in the age of art as investment when people are paying ridiculous sums of money for ridiculous art, should craft matter? I’ve been thinking about this question lately. Walking through the galleries I see a lot of mixed media paintings where artists have mixed oil, acrylic, ink and other media together in one piece. I have seen paint squeezed out of tubes on to unstretched, ungessoed canvas, drawings and oil paintings on newsprint. All of which suggest either a willful neglect or ignorance of materials and craft. Often times it feels like the balance has swung too far in the direction of experimentation, direct expression, originality for fear of becoming academic. It seems to me there is a mistaken belief that craft knowledge hinders one’s ability to create new and meaningful artwork. Of course craft knowledge and technique alone are no guarantee of making good art, a quick glimpse of the current show of the American Watercolor Society at the Salmagundi Club is enough to prove that point.

Anyway, the thought occurred to me last night that if I bought a new house, or had construction work done on a house, and within a few years it started to fall apart because of shoddy craftsmanship and materials, I would be suing the contractors and developers. I’m surprised there isn’t as much outrage when the same thing happens to works of art. If were going to drop $60,000 – $100,000 on a piece of artwork, I don’t care who the artist is, I would want to make damn sure that it would not fall apart in 5-10 years. Maybe there is and I just don’t know about it. Maybe from the collectors’ point of view it is just one of the risks of investment.

But in all fairness to the artists, there is so much stupid money out there right now. If someone is willing to pay me $20,000 for the newspaper I clean my brushes with, then god bless them and thanks for the money. It’s like a fox in the hen house. Anyway, I’d just make sure I’d sign a contract absolving me of all future responsibility for the condition.