Course leaders post script

Rereading my earlier postings on suggestions from my college tutors reveals something in me as much as them. Whilst it may be true that social connections are the biggest factor to success as a furniture maker working to commission what is far more relevant to the number of makers from lower socio economic groups getting through is that few want to do it. It is outside of most peoples frame of reference. It would be a bit Billy Elliot. There is no conspiracy to keep people down, in fact I have usually been welcomed. It is that very few from my world would seek to do it. Just as few aristocrats make it in the graffiti scene or become successful grime rappers so too few black guys or working class Geordies choose to be polo players. The culture of the different classes are invisible or at least tricky for outsiders to understand. What is of interest and I will think further on is the aesthetic drive of the middle class designe r craftsman. The style has the tight perfectionism married to a need for individuate on. The working class makers are more comfortable to stand on the shoulders of history and make work within the design framework already established. Perhaps for fear of trade and due to the middle class need to define itself by desperation from the working class, the need is to confirm self through innovation. They would rather make a work unique to themselves and do it badly and ugly than conform to an established aesthetic. This is one key area where craft is separate from art. Craft is dependent for confirmation of its value on history. It has the support of it's family. Here it is necessary to point out that the middle class craftsman is separate from the working class craftsman who I generally refer to as tradesmen for clarity. The middle class designer maker combines the pristine conservatism with a wacky, obtuse styling. Rarely is it pulled off well. It can be argued that in all fields of creative self expression few pull it off. Half the battle, once you have grown beyond doing the work just for your own satisfaction, is deciding who you are trying to impress. Once you get beyond art therapy and take on the issue of communication you must desire who your audience are. On the council estate, if you want kudos for your aesthetic endeavour perhaps it would be your car you sculpt beyond reason. Take a proletarian vehicle such as a fiesta or escort, raise the rear axel, respray a proud colour, stick huge speakers in the back. Or, one trend I have seen of late at Christmas time is the displays of pulsating light that wrap around the houses up on the mount. Huge santas and rudolphs throb in glowing light. These competitive displays last for over a month each year. This is art. A further area of difference is irony. I often hear it said that it is the British use of irony that separates us from Americans. I believe this is a trait peculiar to the middle class. These aforementioned working class creative displays are straight up. They are done without post modern irony. They are of themselves. It is only the middle classes who pursue this desperate irony. Always scared they are not in on the joke. Always scared to say they like things. It always has to be a guilty pleasure, a cheesy love of culture. They never dare truly like something foe fear of seeming crass or uncool. This need for approval with the confirmation of a label that puts taste out of their hands. They will accommodate an ugly designer chair if the designer is considered cool. Or a Gucci bag because it is known leaving them no need to explain themselves. This is the problem with designer maker furniture. Antiques are beyond reproach having the validity of age. The product designer goods have the labels but our work requires a customer with the strength, with the security of their own social standing to take control and actually dare to choose themselves. This is brave. It leaves them open and vulnerable. With a country awash with interior designers ready to tell the time short what is cool it is hard for people to have the courage of their own taste. Respect all clients that do.