Background: As an art student and craftsman, I am aware that the process of craft affects the making. Last year I wrote an article on ‘Keeping craftsmanship in community practice’, which described the development of craftsmanship in one area of Chengdu, China and the future of craftsmanship for young people in Kyoto, Japan.
I will continue to delve into a group of people, 5-7 artisans in southwest China.
Within the art world, this research explores the making of objects themselves in terms of the tools, materials, processes and procedures of the artisans. Drawing on artisan ethnography and reflexive ethnography, (interviews, interpretative, phenomenological and sensory ethnographic practices). The study explored 5-10 artisans creating different objects in their chosen media.
My research questions were: how do artisans relate to the tools, processes and materials they use, and how does this relationship shape their processes? I want to study through the perspective of materials, tools and processes. I draw primarily from the relational phenomenology of Tim Ingold (2000, 2011, 2013), who explores making by emphasizing the importance of the tools and materials used by the maker, arguing that the process of making is never complete. He sees making as ‘a process of correspondence: not the imposition of preconceived forms on raw materials’ (Ingold, 2013, p. 31).
As we discussed in the tutorial, I need to make sure that every part of the proposal is clearly related to these issues. I need to rebuild so they can fix this.
