One of the most discussed topics in the craft world and that has proponents on both sides is the question can craft work be considered art? I thought I would have a bit of a think about this and note down my thoughts for no other reason than I reckon I have as much of a right to air my thoughts on this as anyone. I further think that in this very question lies the very existence of contemporary crafts in the UK (and probably elsewhere).

As a starting point I thought I'd turn to the dictionary. The dictionary definitions of craft and art (taken from dictionary.com) are:

Craft: an art, trade, or occupation requiring special skill, to make or manufacture (an object, objects, product, etc.) with skill and careful attention to detail.

Art: the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance.

So do these help us start the story? Well not really. It could easily be argued that to draw a picture is a crafts skill just as the ability to make a technically difficult pot an art. Both are correct. Maybe the clue as to the difference is in the definition of art where it talks about aesthetic principles? One of the common reasons people don't consider ceramics (or even worse pottery) as art is in the fact that many pots simply are not that obviously beautiful and are at their roots functional objects. If the difference however is simply that art is nice to look at then how did Greyson Perrys work become art? Or for that matter you are really telling me formaldehide cows are pleasant to live with? No there's something more going on here I think. I personally think the difference is not the physical things at all its the associations that come to mind when you talk about crafts work or tell someone you collect them. They will immediately assume you are buying victorian porcelin, maybe some horrible mass produced animals, or worse they imagine the sort of thing they made when at school aged 8 and brought home to the parents (who filed the "pot" quietly in the attic to be found twenty years later). Frankly the image they will come up with will be less than complimentary. Say you collect art however you are instantly seen in a different light. Put simply "craft" doesn't excite or interest most people where as "Art" fires the imagination and for some reason makes people sit up and take notice. Don't believe me? Ask anyone if they've been to an Art gallery in the last year. Now ask the same question but substitue in the word craft for art. See? Thats the difference.

Do you know what I've come to the conclusion that I don't really know what makes a craft or art. I may consider this more in future and follow this post up but I do however think that it is increasingly unhelpful to talk about ceramics in terms of a craft especially where people's livelihoods are at stake which they are increasingly are. I increasingly feel that for ceramics to be considered a true art form and to allow the artists to get the recognition they fully deserve in terms of publicity, interest in their work and the subsequent boost to the amounts they can charge for their work, the whole craft sector must rebrand itself and the "craft" word should be no where in site. It would also maybe generate interest in a new generation of collectors that I suspect will be badly needed in a few years time. Most auctions that I go to I am usually, by some margin, the youngest person in the room and I have to unfortunately conceed these days that I am almost the wrong side of thirty so can hardly be considered a youngster anymore. Put simply without growing publicity then in twenty years time I suspect the market for crafts will not be larger, as the crafts council hopes, but considerably smaller and that would be a devastation for many working potters today. How can this be avoided? If I had a three part plan:

• Drop the word craft where appropriate.
  
• Encourage craft as its currently known to be shown alongside traditional art to be appreciated as such.
  
• Promote the key selling points of contemporary crafts that the buyer is buying uniqueness. This is crafts USP in business speak and I don't feel that its used even 10% as much as it could be. People like owning things others, put simply, can't. Call it greed, call it possessiveness, call it consumerism, its a fact.

Please mail me you comments about this article. Its an important debate to talk about.