The Revolution in Three Parts: Part 2 - The Revolution Begins

I am using a 1-5 revolutionary rating scale to evaluate the activities. I hope this gives you a sense of just how controversial the programming was.

Day 1

Professional Development Seminar Part 1 – Marla Johnson

Marla Johnson of Aristotle Design, a marketing and web design firm in Little Rock, Arkansas, organized her presentation in two parts. The first part of her presentation focused on improving web visibility through a combination of understanding google’s ranking algorithm and prioritizing search terms. The second part of Marla’s talk had to do with social networking in driving business and building brand image. Chances are if you are reading this on my blog, that blogs, facebook, twitter, and youtube are about as revolutionary as a ham sandwich. The information was good (although sometimes necessarily basic for a general audience) and the speaking was fairly dynamic, but not juicy as part two……



Professional Development Seminar Part 2 – Galleries in an age of Digital Commerce

Karen Lorene – Facere Gallery – Seattle
Patti Bleicher – Gallery Loupe – Mont Clair, NJ
Whitney Couch – Object Fetish – Online Gallery
Sienna Patti – Sienna Gallery – Lenox, MA
Beth Ann Gerstein – Society of Arts and Crafts, Boston
Ruth Snyderman – The Works Gallery, Philadelphia

This was a panel discussion of gallerists moderated by the PDS organizers. The role of the gallery in today’s jewelry/ craft marketplace is hot topic about which I blogged a few months back, and it was clear out of the gate that the panel was going to get the tough questions. The first question essentially asked the panel to justify their continued existence, (“What does a brick and mortar gallery offer that an online one cannot?”) and by mid way through the conversation the gallerists began to look flustered at being ambused. While the tone was a bit us and them, (between the artists and the gallerists) PDS organizers Andy Cooperman and Harriete Estel Berman wanted to really get to the meat. And there were interesting moments, most of which resulted from ego conflicts. Highlights: the admission that you can pay blog writers to talk about your gallery (good bye journalistic integrity), that some gallerists recognize that studio jewelry is a small market and they are okay with that, and that every customer is a collector they just don’t know it yet. The issue of the a gallerist as an agent came up, with the general consensus being that with the amount of artists each gallery represents, they cannot be an effective career manager. I wonder then with internet sales venues, marginal advocacy activities, and a fifty percent share going to the middlemen, why the gallery remains such a dominant force in studio jewelry dissemination? It must be because artists are incompetent business people that don't know how to deal with the public. Boy am I sick of that line. For a more complete transcript check out Emiko Oye's blog Reware Revolutionary Rating: 3 – A public demonstration

Pin Swap

My partner Amy Weiks and I made 100+ pins for the swap, and some were to advertise the blog, so if this is your first time to the blog, welcome. My pins were meant to be provocative and esoteric sporting such slogans as: Write., Fuck Big Jewelry, Big Fucking Jewelry, [Harlan] Butt: Good for Metalsmithing, Etsy Sucks, Etsy is Awesome, Blog this Pin, Future Metalsmithing Legend, Europe Called. Ya, its spelled Jewellery, etc. It was a laugh.

Day 2

Conference Chair, Doug Bucci opened the day with remarks that explained the theme of the conference, Revolution, as looking at Revolutions in the past, present and future. A welcome explanation, even if quite vague. Stanley Lechtzin was given the lifetime achievement award before presenting his own lecture.

Stanley Lechtzin – The American Metalsmithing Revolutionaries
Stanley began his lecture by affirming his conviction that evolution more accurately describes the natural order development in metalsmithing than revolution. However, upon further contemplation Lechtzin concluded that historical Academic figures in Metalsmithing. best represent the theme of Revolution. While no doubt important in the history and lineage of metalsmithing at present, the application of any sort of critical study of the figures was conspicuously absent. Instead footage from some unknown (to me at least) source, was liberated in order to allow the audience to hear early and mid 20th century academics, such as Ron Pearson, Arlene Fisch, and Richard Thomas explain how they came to be influential teachers quite by happenstance. There was no overarching narrative, which I longed for, but none-the-less it was interesting to put faces with names that I have long held in revere. Revolutionary rating: 1 – Not the slightest hint of agitation.

Dr. Sandra Alfoldy – Imagining Ourselves: Looking into the Future of Craft

After an introduction by Elizabeth Argo of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Dr. Alfoldy launched into a rebuke of Garth Clark’s 2008 lecture at the Museum of Contemporary Craft in Portland, OR (entitled How Envy Killed the Crafts: An Autopsy in Two Parts). Alfoldy’s talk presented a refutation, which fell short of changing my mind, primarily because it didn’t present an organized or critically reasoned case. Alfoldy announced the 3 part organization of the talk would cover the popular, political, and global aspects of craft, which she examined in her craft history classes at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. She gave evidence of surveys her students conducted about the public perception of craft, which sounded promising, as she related that craft in the public’s mind is primarily associated with domestic mavens like Martha Stewart. However, she departed from her stated rubric for building a case for craft's vitality. An abridged history of craft came next which spanned Van Eyck’s Goldsmiths Guild (talk about pandering) to Deutche Werkbund, the German version of the English Arts and Crafts movement (about 5 centuries). But it wasn't the lack of clear organization that troubled me in particular. Since the lecture was framed as a response to Garth Clark's assertion that craft is dead, I would have expected Alfoldy to specifically refute the claims of craft's financial and organizational insolvency, which Alfoldy ignored. It was around the time that Alfoldy finished her abridged history of craft that I first noticed that her argument was troublingly thin. Clark's authority on the business of craft simply could not be refuted by an academic, and Alfoldy's focus of craft as a thriving and vibrant practice is beside the point of Clark's argument. Of course the audience would have had to have heard Garth Clark's lecture in order to put this in perspective, so for most the talk was an affirmation, which closed by telling the audience craft was alive and well, instead of providing any meaningful call to action. That craft is a robust practice capable of producing interesting objects and activities was a surprise to no one. To call that scholarship is symptomatic of the low level of criticallity in the field. Make no mistake that Alfoldy was a great public speaker, but for me content is king. One last note, to anyone who dares to invoke the name William Morris, don't use his life's work as a craft advocate and socialist to build your case, and then at the end of your talk declare that the young patrons of indie craft will eventually grow to appreciate higher or finer craft objects. Sandra and Elizabeth, please remember that Morris withdrew from his company in disgust of his inability to reconcile his socialist beliefs with the wares he was producing for his bourgeois patrons. Should the most democratic class of craft patrons today aspire up the economic craft ladder to what you believe to be "fine craft?" I believe you are on the wrong side of Morris here. Also, for the record iPod cozies do serve a function; to protect the iPod from scratching and damage. Revolutionary rating: 4 - Boston Tea Party. Though I felt it to be more along the lines of the counter revolution.

Leo Caballero of Klimt02 gave a lecture in the afternoon which was hampered by his language skills (unfortunately), but there was some gems in there, I only wish I could have simply read the talk. A video which promoted Klimt02 was shown at the end. It was great, although I found the juxtaposition of images of contemporary sculpture (Damien Hirstamong them) and contemporary jewelry a heavy handed supplication. 1 - Not the slightest hint of agitation.

Conversation with the Board

SNAGs financial crisis is over! After the concern over budget short falls and the loss SNAG would take on heavy student attendance at the 2008 Savannah Conference, SNAG ended 2008 with a nearly $70,000 surplus. Good job Stewart Thomson!

Several topics came up in a candid round table discussion. The first issue, which was sort of a lark into intellectual property with several voices giving conflicting advise, most of which conflicted wit the advice I had received from a recent consultation I had with an IP lawyer. Not very helpful. I brought up the suggestion that students should be involved in planning the conference by including them in planning committees, so as to give young people a voice and extend the hand of inclusion. The theme of extending a hand to students would be revisited on Day 3. An African American male conference attendee addressed his concern to the board about the lack of diversity of conference attendees and the membership of the organization in general. The response he received was completely unacceptable. Instead of owning this glaring problem, apologizing and vowing to work harder to reach out in the future, the response was one of justifications and sympathy. It is the mark of good leadership to acknowledge failure. I suggest that the board soon acknowledges that SNAG has failed on the diversity issue. There seemed to be no animosity in the discussion however.

Comments Welcome,
More soon... stay tuned!

-Gabriel