Ethics of Learning & Teaching

Jewelry Discussion
21 
Teaching anything at a professional level, especially applied
technique and refined hand skills, theoretically requires a depth
of understanding of the process on the part of the teacher and
proven fluency with the tools and materials being employed

Thank you, Michael. Orchid is a wonderful place - we all love it and
use it, but it is symptomatic of this issue, too. Many times someone
will ask, “How can I make so-and-so?”, and get requisite answers,
and that’s all well and good. I will answer anything that’s asked of
me, myself. Why? Because it really makes no difference.

Hand me a quarter ounce of silver or gold scrap and I’ll deliver to
you a finished wedding band in 1/2 hour or so, working at a normal
pace. Same with setting a tennis bracelet of 50 stones or so - just
about an hour, ready to polish, working at a normal pace. The real
point is that I’m not special - my peers work at about the same
pace. My job is to make whatever anybody wants made - that’s what I
do. I don’t do that because I’ve made everything there ever was -
it’s knowing how things are made, and the fundamentals behind
everything. These all are things that can’t be taught in a week’s
class or a posting on Orchid. Projects are fine to illustrate a
point, but the greater knowlege is more illusive than that. The
analogy of doctors was raised - seems a lot of people want to be
doctors without going to medical school, but it just doesn’t work
like that. First you take anatomy…

I will say the unspoken - the notion that there is such a thing as
“Art Jewelry” carries much baggage. It creates an unneccessary Us vs
them posture, it’s simply not true, and most importantly it insulates
the academic world from the centuries of tradition and knowlege that
the world of jewelry has to offer. Technique is technique, jewelry is
jewelry. That is unless you don’t think Faberge wasn’t making art…

22 
My answer is that if someone teaches you something in a workshop
or class that means you can do whatever you want with it.
Otherwise, why did they teach it to you?

Well, I guess I wouldn’t take it quite this far. If I show someone
how I make my particular style (as in the Art Jewelry article this
month), I think it’s just fine if someone makes that piece, if they
can. I would NOT consider it fine if I teach a project and next
thing I know, they are at shows selling dozens of that same piece.
It is not illegal, and we cannot prevent it, but as Michael Sturlin
said, it is a cheap knock-off.

We can only trust that 1) a creative person will take the ideas and
run with them, so the work wioll inevitably be different, and that
2) a non-creative person will produce only stagnant copies and will
not flourish. In the next life, if not in this one!

Noel

23

Hi Noel,

I guess the question I was getting at was not is anyone free to
use a technique but are they free to teach it to others?

In my opinion, for this situation that you ask about: it is fine to
teach it to weekly classes in your local area, but it is
inappropriate to offer workshops on the topic.

Warm wishes,
Cindy

24 
I would NOT consider it fine if I teach a project and next thing I
know, they are at shows selling dozens of that same piece. It is
not illegal, and we cannot prevent it, but as Michael Sturlin said,
it is a cheap knock-off.

Actually, what I said is that the derivative teaching of someone
else’s material is like a cheap knock off. No connection was implied
in my statement to reproducing a specific project or a proprietary
design in this context.

I teach process and fundamental technique in my instruction, not
projects, so I am not concerned with this in the way which Noel
mentions it. I do however feel this issue can also just as easily be
prevented. If the project has proprietary content and the workshop
materials clearly stipulate any limitations of use or restriction on
commercial reproduction of the items, the legal status has been
properly defined.

A better solution is to create practical exercises for workshop
projects which do not have proprietary content to worry about. No
point in trying to teach students to make “your work” if you want to
assist them in learning how to make their work.

When I teach forging we learn a vocabulary of shapes as our practical
exercises. We then articulate that vocabulary into several specific
ring designs. There are a couple hundred of my students from these
workshops in circulation wearing the same rings on their fingers.
Many of these artists are probably also making and selling their own
enhanced version of them now in their current work.

Even though these ring designs are content which I conceived and
created through my development of a curriculum to teach fundamental
goldsmithing skills, they are not entirely uniquely original in
concept.

If you gave a half a dozen accomplished goldsmiths the same tool and
material, and the same set of criteria; to make forms that were
transitions and gradients articulated as rings; at least 4 of them
would create items nearly identical to mine. Maybe all 6 of them
would. It is in the fundamental nature of the applied technique and
within the inherent working properties of the raw material to create
these or very similar objects. A skilled goldsmith who is proficient
with the tool and fluent with the material will find these shapes to
be the natural expression of the stated criteria.

This last sentence is a bit on the philosophical side, but that part
of my workshop instruction is gratis anyway…A person can create
impediments in their work and look at the problems they encounter as
being obstacles they have to labor and climb over. A person can
alternately choose to percieve these as challenges instead and accept
them as opportunites for growth. With that change in perception comes
the realization that these are the steps which elevate us upwards and
propel us forward in our studio practice.

Personal choice really, but that’s what perspective is all about.

Michael David Sturlin

1 Like
25

Hi Cindy,

it is fine to teach it to weekly classes in your local area, but it
is inappropriate to offer workshops on the topic.

I teach what I think is the technique that works best for me. It
seems to work well for my students too.

Richard
www.richard-whitehouse.co.uk

26 
I guess the question I was getting at was not is anyone free to use
a technique but are they free to teach it to others? 

In my opinion, for this situation that you ask about: it is fine
to teach it to weekly classes in your local area, but it is
inappropriate to offer workshops on the topic.

I am in agreement with Cynthia on this point. If you learn a
technique in a workshop or seminar or symposium, or through private
instruction, the primary intention should be on incorporating the
technique into your body of work for your own personal use. If the
primary intention is to add the technique to your teaching repertoire
and then in turn teach it yourself, that is a questionable motive.

Michael David Sturlin

27 
someone had a copyright and patent on not only the simple and very
old technique i was teaching but also on the design. in the
BROADEST sense. basically, the copyright covered any way you could
possibly make this item, even if it looked completely different than
the copyright & patent owner's design. i never even suspected that
someone would try to claim this technique as their OWN and i
certainly never ever suspected they would get a patent and a
copyright on it.

Copyright is not difficult to get, and it is also very easy to
challenge. On copyright application, there is a section where one has
to indicate wether the work is completely original, or is based on
other works to some degree. If one can show that technique or design
was used before, but copyright was obtained as for completely
original
work, such copyright is invalid.

Also it is important to read what was actually copyrighted. Not
everything is protected under copyright, so any threats of law suit
should be taken with a grain of salt. One way of handing something
like that is to write to the copyright holder and ask him what was
actually copyrighted and in what way your work violates his rights.
This usually clears the issue.

Leonid Surpin

28 
I'm writing the critique especially for the teacher hoping it will
have an effect. My reservation was whether I should post the
critique on Orchid and whether the editors would allow it.

I have taught for 16 years and at 5 or more different art centers
over the years. I get 95% or more positive ratings, but if someone
had a beef with me, I would be mortified if they posted to Orchid
without first making an effort to talk to my art center about me.

The artist teacher you want to help improve is an employee or
contractor with the art center. The art center wants that feedback in
an appropriate way and they can talk with their employee/ contractor
about it.

We should always make an effort to let a company or person resolve
the situation personally before “taking it public,” it’s only fair.

Elaine
http://www.CreativeTextureTools.com

29

beth - sounds like you have a specific point in this thread about
the joy and beauty of sharing all peace luv and
bellbottoms. you must remember knowlege is power, not that we lord
that power over others like slave holders but more like it is the
empowerment to take care of ourselves make enough to live on send
children to school and pay for a houseand a transport.

this is the other point of view, i do not like to tell my
secrets,because knowlege is not free and should be protected and
respected. here in the USA it is not like europe and great brittain
where they have a guild and apprentice system, that system protects
the jewelers and the buyers. here in the USA any fool can sell
jewelry or melt scrap into somthing that is called jewelry and never
think twice about being held responsible.

MY own personal point of view on the ethics of learning and teaching
is this, there seems to be a lack of respect for responsibility on
both sides of the educational set up here in the the USA. schools and
universities are happy to take your money and teach you all sorts of
valid wonderfull technique, tricks, hand out very impressive
documentation that are well earned, but, leave students basiclly
unmarketable in thier field because big box industry and popular
culture makes money off of the products big industry has carpeted us
over with not from cool hammering techniques learned at college.

From the other direction students come to a craftsman with request
of being taught and willing to work and then as soon as they think
they know somthing they take off and the employer never gets to
recoup the investment. after a couple of times the employer figures
out that these folks mostly have a quiet agenda and does not want to
hire anyone without experience.

any how that is what comes to my mind when i read the subject ethics
of learning and teaching

best regards goo

30 
I try to concentrate more on the ones who are going to catch fire
from me and shine in the field, because they're much more
interesting and rewarding to me.

I can’t copy other’s designs. I tried it once, purely for my own use
and because I couldn’t afford to buy the particular designer’s wares
that I admired - my usual policy is to buy from others if I like
their designs, not to copy. But when I attempted to make something in
this person’s style, my brain took me off in a completely different
direction and I made something that looks nothing like its
inspiration but that has been admired by many people since. I have a
picture of the piece I really love on my computer, and when I look at
it, I tell myself that maybe one day I’ll be able to afford to buy
one from him/ her.

But in the meantime, I love being inspired by other people - it
challenges me to come up with new designs.

Helen
UK
http://www.hillsgems.co.uk
http://www.helensgems.etsy.com

31

John Donivan and Michael David Sturlin,

Thank you both so much for your insightful replies on this subject.
You have hit the nail on the head from both directions. Normally I
don’t post to Orchid, but I faithfully read every day and wanted to
thank you both for echoing my own thoughts on this subject.

Beverly A. Carter
An always learning metalsmith and not ashamed to admit it!

32

AMEN, Loren! I feel the same way. I am so excited when my students
blossom and do something entirely different with this technique.

Since it is a and new and different way of crocheting, the whole
world is open for creative spirits to alter it, explore it and take
it to a new level. I am learning new things about it every day. The
only thing that I ask my students is not to copy my work for sale at
shows that I do, or to teach it ,as it is my livelyhood. But when I
see the projects that they have made me, it really is exciting.

I love to see the struggle, and the “ah ha” moment and then see them
take off.

Joan Dulla

33 
i was threatened with a lawsuit over one of the projects in my
book "The Art and Craft of Making Jewelry" because someone had a
copyright and patent on not only the simple and very old technique
i was teaching but also on the design.

Joanna’s story and some other posts on this thread have clarified to
me some meaning that I believe is a difference of language. One
definition of technique:

a method of performance or execution, skill in the execution of an
art or specialized activity.

This all could be argued about till the end of time - “art
philosophy”. To me it’s still very simple - when you teach someone
how to twist wire, you are teaching technique. When you bend that
twist into a bracelet, then it’s design. When you teach someone that
a stone is set by pinching it between upper and lower bearings, that
is technique. When you say to use this kind of wire in that sort of
arrangement, that is design.

Telling someone that a hammer is used in these generic ways is,
again, technique. Pulling out some piece and saying, “Look how they
used a hammer to get these effects.” is design. Now, I’ll say again
that I’m not the ethics police - don’t want the job. When a teacher
crosses the line between showing methods (techniques) into how
people in the real world have put those methods to use (design),
they are definitely opening up another world of stepping on
hypersensitive toes, though. There hangs the question, I guess. As
has been said on this thread, I’m not sure that “Let’s copy this
piece” actually qualifies as real teaching anyway, and if that’s not
being done, then why the question?

34

This is one of the best threads I’ve read on Orchid lately! Karen,
Cindy, and many others have shared great answers to such a tough and
potentially sticky topic. Sustaining techniques by passing them down
is a subject very close to my heart because I am so grateful to
those who taught me. Using the techniques to the best of my ability,
adding to them, and passing them on to new generations of smiths is
the best thanks I believe I can give.

Knowing the difference in learning by copying and flat out plagiarism
needs to be part of everyone’s education. As others have mentioned,
copying old masters was the standard way to learn to paint for
centuries, and exhibiting works “in the tradition of” has a long and
rich art history, such as the work of Manet. Plagiarism is printing
the Mona Lisa on t-shirts and signing your own name.

The best way to share assimilated knowledge involves honoring its
lineage. The style of granulation I do is based on what I learned
from John Cogswell. While I’ve experimented and changed much of what
I originally learned, I’m always happy to credit him for being the
person who got me started with the technique. It’s completely
impossible not to share what we learn from others unless we’ve
spontanously acquired skills and techniques in a vacuum.

None of us likes feeling taken advantage of or that other’s are
making money off our labor while we get no compensation. It’s a knee
jerk reaction that many have about needing to survive in a
challenging economy.

One of the students in a workshop I taught this past weekend was
wearing a ring she had made that was a project I designed and taught
in a different workshop at the same center 4 years ago. She had not
learned it from me but from a fellow instructor, who had taken that
workshop from me. Because I put the how-to out there, the student was
certainly free to make the ring, but what really made me angry was
that the other instructor had passed it off as her own design.

I’ve had many similar experiences with this center, including my
former students, whom I hired to teach when I ran the department,
repeatedly teaching very specific (and relatively obscure) techniques
that they learned from me in their own weekly classes and that I
continue to offer as workshops there. Despite doing nearly everything
the way I do it, they give me no credit. (Yes, those knife marks in
my back are getting a touch old.) - Noel, I’m sure that wouldn’t be
the reason you were criticized for sharing. (I just needed to vent
my frustration.)

Joanna, I’m working on a book on chains, and you have just
completely freaked me out! I’m so very sorry for what you had to
endure!

Best wishes,
Victoria
Victoria Lansford

35

Interesting thread, Noel.

So the question I'm asking for comment on: As long as the results
don't look like the work of some individual, i.e. there is no
direct copying taking place, can anyone expect to restrict the free
flow of ideas and techniques? And, is there a difference between
teaching in the classroom and in print, ethically speaking?

I think that there is very little that is truly “new” under the sun!
If one looks at ancient jewelry, one soon sees modern replicas in the
marketplace. Even though someone may have come up with the concept
without ever seeing the ancient piece, is it original?? Yes, but not
really.

I agree with you in that when I discover a new method or concept, it
should be shared - whether in the classroom or print makes no
difference. Most likely, my discovery is not “new”, but just
coincidence. Orchid is the “flower” of all those discoveries and I
hope it keeps on blooming!

Judy in Kansas, who is finally seeing wonderful ripe tomatoes on the
vine!

36

It is a truth that more time paying dues at the bench WILL make one
a better jeweler, though.

John’s comments reminded me of an observation I recently made (this
is a little off the topic but we can blame John for that). It’s one
of those plain as day things that you never see. I started as a
goldsmith 30 years ago, before Federal Express, before anyone knew
who Matt Stuller was. Way back then, unless you had a jewelers
building in town, you couldn’t get anything overnight… it took a
few days at best to get anything you needed. So we had to fabricate
many of our parts. We pulled wire to make our basket settings,
poured ingots to roll out out shank stock, etc. We really had no
choice, the jobs were due and must be finished like it or not.

Now you can order almost any finding or component overnight. That
leads me to my observation. One of our goldsmiths, who works in a
different city, came into the main shop for some training. He
brought along a job to size a ring with a super heavy shank. He said
they didn’t have stock big enough to do it. I said we would just
make it, he asked how? I was stunned! What did he mean how!?! I
showed him to the ingot mold and then the rolling mill. I made sure
he was aware of the draw plates as well. The observation was that
there is a whole generation of goldsmiths who are primarily
assemblers. I don’t intend this to be insulting, they are just a
product of their times (and of course this does not apply to
everyone). They are very rarely forced to make the components they
need to do the job, this is particularly true of goldsmiths in busy
shops. They can spend their whole careers just ordering stuff and
putting it together, if they can’t order it they just say it can’t
be done!

I see this as a big problem. I can work to address it in my little
world but what about everybody else?

Mark

37 
If you learn a technique in a workshop or seminar or symposium, or
through private instruction, the primary intention should be on
incorporating the technique into your body of work for your own
personal use. If the primary intention is to add the technique to
your teaching repertoire and then in turn teach it yourself, that
is a questionable motive.

This is an interesting thread. I’m going to go back to the medical
analogy, and ask how you think a doctor should learn to be a
surgeon, if another doctor who has already learned doesn’t teach her
technique to the new doctor? Who one then hopes will in turn teach it
to another doctor, and so on. I would assume that along the way part
of the technique would stay the same, and each doctor probably adds a
bit of a new or personal twist.

Jewelry seems the same to me. How are we to ensure that today’s
knowledge is continued into the future if we don’t teach it? And if
you don’t allow someone you have taught to then teach it forward,
then the knowledge ends with your death and the death of your actual
students… since you did not permit them to teach it to anyone
else. This seems extremely short-sighted to me.

I do not have a technique I have developed in metals, but I have
been an artist for many, many years, and have both a unique
printmaking technique I developed and a unique fibers technique I
developed. I not only teach workshops on them, but specifically teach
workshops to teachers, with the absolute intent that they pass the
technique on! Why should it die with me?? I’m a draw a circle to
include others person, not a draw a circle to exclude them person.

That said, there is certainly every reason to then credit the person
who developed the technique, and pass that forward also.
I understand not wanting to have your investment in developing a
technique abused, but at the same time I think it is crucial that we
recognize the importance of continuing knowledge; and recognize the
limitations to that we impose if we refuse to permit those we have
taught to teach in turn.

I have always found it very sad when I read about someone who
developed a technique, in whatever field, and you read “…and how
to do xxx died with her/him”. What a shame! What a gift they could
have given humanity if they had either passed that knowledge on when
they were alive, or made provision for it to be passed on after their
death.

On the other hand, if you take a workshop with the specific intent
of then teaching that exact technique, I do agree with Michael that
you should be honest with the instructor in advance. I think
generally one would teach workshops based out of one’s own work,
which if you have taken workshops will undoubtedly incorporate bits
you have learned in them. These should, however, be filtered through
your own experience and aesthetic, and not be a direct copy of the
workshop you took.

Beth in SC

38 
If you learn a technique in a workshop or seminar or symposium, or
through private instruction, the primary intention should be on
incorporating the technique into your body of work for your own
personal use. If the primary intention is to add the technique to
your teaching repertoire and then in turn teach it yourself, that
is a questionable motive.

So, when a number of my students over time wanted to learn various
stone setting techniques I didn’t know, and I decided to invest my
time and money to go to the New Approach School to take Stone
Setting from Blaine Lewis, that was wrong?

Noel

39

I have an additional closing observation to contribute to this
thread. I’ll try to make this my last opinionated discourse on the
subject.

There are individuals out there who take a class or watch what
another artist or instructor is doing, or see something in a book or
magazine and then think to themselves, “hey, I can teach that to my
students”. Some of them even make public statements about how they
are always looking for new projects to teach, or looking for
recognition as a teacher, and so forth.

This suggests to me that this particular type of individual is
relying on external sources for the content of what they teach,
rather than realizing it through an internal body of knowledge.

The not uncommon product of this is a poorly rewritten version of
someone else’s tip or technique or adaptation of a process, which is
really just the repackaging of someone else’s material in a different
wrapper. In a sense it is a counterfeit being passed off as genuine.
If it is being bought and paid for by anyone, a publication or a
workshop attendee for example, it is certainly a question of
impropriety.

What I have seen most recently in this regard didn’t even manage to
communicate the most important and succinct essential core
of the “borrowed” item, nor was any credit given in print
to the actual origin of the instruction. This I personally find
unethical, but that’s just my perspective.

If a person is trying to find their content through a process of
“outsourcing” and is not summoning it up from within by relying on
personal fluency and the accomplishment of their own work, anything
they teach will be of limited value and of questionable origin. In
this case the title of teacher is just a label of what they want to
be, not a description of who they are.

Michael David Sturlin
www.goldcrochet.com
www.michaeldavidsturlin.com

40

Hi all:

I’ve been reading this thread with some interest. I was on the road,
and can read from my web-account, but not post, so I was curious to
see where the discussion would end up by the time I could say
anything. It’s taken an interesting turn.

As far as teaching specific techniques is concerned, I’ve never
understood the problem. OK, so it’s a technique. Unless you invented
it from whole-cloth, where’s your margin in getting bent that someone
else is teaching it? (And if you DID invent it whole, you must have
taught someone who let it loose, so it’s your own fault.) Are you
saying that you have so little confidence in your own skill at that
some other clod can teach it better than you can? If so, I would
hazard that the problem lies not with the other teacher. With the old
guard passing on, there’s only one way to save all the centuries of
accumulated knowledge in the field: teach, teach, and then take
workshops. Getting bent about ‘that’s mine!’ isn’t going to do
anybody any good in the long run. The only people who’d care aren’t
the problem anyway.

Equally, on design, I have no problem showing my students how I do
things. I know perfectly well that they won’t turn into mini-me’s.
They can’t. I’ve climbed so far up the technology tree that they
pretty much can’t follow me into the things I do for real. They
simply don’t have the gear. On the other hand, showing them how I
approach solving problems is very useful to them, and seeing how
useful oddball knowledge can be is also a good thing for them.
Besides, if I can’t be me better than someone else can pretend to be
me, the problem isn’t them.

As far as knocking off someone else’s design: generally even the ones
who try end up somewhere else, and they learned things along the way,
so I don’t have a problem with trying it…once. A straight out copy,
repeatedly, for sale, that’s a whole 'nother ball of wax, but
fortunately not one I normally have to deal with. But again, if you
(the designer) can’t be more original than someone pretending to be
you, than they’re not really the problem.

Cheers-
Brian Meek.