I just love the notion of precious materials process engineer!
I think that is one of the funniest things I have heard. Brought a
smile to my face instantly.
Thanks,
Frank
Jo,
I had said..."If two people have the same skills, one makes jewellery for a client according to their (client's) requirements, the manufacturer is a craftsman. If the other person works without commission and makes a piece according to their (own)requirements, they are an artist...
But you have just described yourself as an artist… and you make
what YOU want to… This is exactly as I defined it, isn’t it?
Gwen
There ain't no Union, neither.
Although this is (IMO) kind of a useless discussion… Richard
isn’t entirely correct, either.
I was a member of the IJWU, and an officer… Local 12. My boss was a
trustee of the pension fund so we weren’t privy to the national
membership negotiations but were more involved than most. Shortly
after I left to open this business, and quit my membership, the IJWU
merged with the SEIU. That was 1980. For those of you non-Americans
or who just don’t know, the SEIU is service employees - restaurant,
hotel, others… At that time the IJWU ceased to exist AS SUCH. If a
shop is a union shop now it will be the SEIU.
As to whether there are still such shops, I would think so but I
don’t know the actual answer to that.
I will at first state that I am a Master Goldsmith.
May I explain, Here in the UK we have Liveried companies of most
ancient trades, mine is called “The Worshipful Company of
Goldsmiths”.
When I started in this trade I was indentured as an apprentice
goldsmith and trained by a master goldsmith. A Master Goldsmith is
one who trains apprentices. To explain my career run, I was an
apprentice for approximately six years, I started at the age of 15
and finished on my 21st birthday. On finishing my apprenticeship I
became a journeyman goldsmith, a freeman of the goldsmith’s company
and a freeman of the City of London. I was a journeyman until I
started teaching my own apprentice, then I became a master goldsmith.
Being a master goldsmith was nothing to do with quality of work, or
work achievement it was just the fact that I had become a master to
an apprentice.
To be more precise, when apprentices are indentured at the
Goldsmith’s Hall their apprentice papers actually state which part of
the trade you are being apprenticed into. That means those who make
jewellery are indentured as apprentice jewellers and each craft skill
is also seperated. In the company where I first worked we had many
apprentices, there were apprentice goldsmiths, silversmiths,
boxmakers, engravers, flutemakers, chasers, engine turners, stone
setters, jewellers and of course polishers and platers. Each
apprentice would have their trade choice printed on their apprentice
papers, so when they finished their apprenticeship the would be
called a goldsmith, a silversmith, an engraver, a jeweller and so on.
I had the word goldsmith so on completion of my time I was called a
goldsmith as printed on my papers. Altough whenever I have entered
my pieces into the annual Goldsmiths Arts Council competition, I
entered the my pieces into what was called the “Smallworkers”
section. Within the trade in the UK I am called a Smallworker
Goldsmith. Silversmiths also work in gold at times but they still
regard themselves as silversmiths. As a goldsmith I can make
jewellery, clock cases, objects d-art, badges and medals, boxes and
many other small pieces, I can also engrave and raise as a
silversmith to a certain level. Having these skills has meant that I
have had quite an interesting and rewarding career in my trade. So I
say to all, forget about the trade titles and try everything, as
metal shaping can be the most rewarding career.
Sorry if I have gone on a bit and repeated other’s opinions, it’s an
age thing.
If you are interested in seeing more about the Goldsmiths Company
they have a good website, if you take time and explore you can find a
wealth of about this trade of ours.
Thanks John D. for starting an interesting thread.
James Miller FIPG.
I dunno, maybe artistry and craftsmanship go hand in hand, since
craftsmanship implies, if not mastery, at least proficiency in the
skills needed to execute your art.
Its not just the concept of a painting, or a ring, or a novel that
holds your interest…its the execution, the sometimes mundane
details that cumulatively make the experience of the artwork…well,
worthwhile. Can you be an artist without also being a craftsman?
If one differentiates between artist and craftsman by who initiates
the work, what does that do in the case of a commissioned portrait in
oils for example? Is that any less art than a subject totally at the
artist’s discretion?
Is it pandering to take commissioned work? Or is it more
difficult/rewarding to please a specific client than oneself?
Sometimes we lie to ourselves, ya know? Then again sometimes the
client doesn’t see everything we see in a piece. We could go round
and round.
Ok, now my head is blurry, I’m going back to work to clear it. I want
to get my hands dirty. I want to conquer something. Jewelry, hotrods,
I’m not particular.
Can you be an artist without also being a craftsman?
This thread has touched off an interesting discussion in my shop.
One of the most common questions I face with apprentices is
basically, how do you learn design? My answer is to learn technique,
the design skills will follow.
I liken it to learning to play a musical instrument and learning to
compose music. If you know three or four chords, you can create your
own compositions, but your ability to write new and truly original
music is pretty limited (Bob Dylan and Arlo Guthrie notwithstanding
). When you can come up with any chord you need by feel alone, and
can play scales in any key without a thought, you are ready to start
composing your own music.
But the truth is, when you get to that level, you already are
composing or you wouldn’t be at that level.
Jewelry design is really no different. When you can flush set a
round stone, solder a shank and do a hammered finish, your repertoire
of skills available for design are rather limited. When you can
channel set tapered baguettes in a graduated and curved one-sided
channel, bead set or pave’ any shape or contoured surface using any
size or type of stone, carve a wax or fabricate about any design for
any stone put in front of you, your design skills will already be
there. You won’t have to learn much of anything else to be able to
design properly. You will already be designing or you wouldn’t have
those skills.
So to answer Neil’s very pointed and focused question, no, imho. In
our trade and artistic field, if you want to be a real artist and do
things others aren’t doing, you must have the real skills to back it
up. I would also agree with what I think Neil was implying, that to
make your own designs requires skill and artistic ability and could
easily be called art, but to take someone else’s idea, especially a
non-jeweler retail custom client and create their vision requires
more than just the requisite skills needed to make jewelry. It also
requires skill in communication, engineering and maybe least
important, design. Does that mean that such jewelry is not art?
Don’t know, don’t really care. It touches a chord in the customer’s
heart, and that’s what pays the bills.
Dave Phelps
precisionplatinumjewelry.com
Being a master goldsmith was nothing to do with quality of work, or work achievement
James, that’s one of the huge differences between America and the UK
- no organization… Here in the States the term IS used almost
excluxively as a “quality of work” word, almost always by the work-er
(read: ego). Some body uses that word about me now and then and I
just smile and say, “You’ve never seen James Miller’s work…” Or
something like that… ;
James,
It’s unfortunate that apprentices are limited by age. As a young man.
no, not a man, a teenage boy, I received virtually no counseling
about my future. I got zilch from school, parents, anyone. Now that
I’ve got a number of years behind me I find myself wishing I could
go back and partake in programs such as the apprenticeship you went
through.
Mike DeBurgh, GJG
Henderson, NV
how do you learn design? My answer is to learn technique, the design skills will follow.
I don’t think you can count on that. I’m an oddball. I’ve got BFA
and MFA degrees in metalsmithing and also have apprenticed, and
worked in the retail jewelry trade as a custom jeweler for 30 years.
I write articles for trade magazines about design and production of
jewelry I’ve designed and produced a lot of jewelry, some for
distribution to companies like May-Straus and Dayton-Hudson
(department store chains). Design is no less a skill than setting
stones or soldering. What is see is this:
Those jewelers who never deliberately look into design as a
discipline, with rules and a history, end up with stuff that has a
generic and/or awkward form. They pick each others pockets without
even knowing it. On the other hand, I would agree that technique is
crucial to good design. I know a lot of schools that fit the
description of both types of programs, the “technique is everything,
design is for poseurs” type and the “content is primary, technique
doesn’t matter” type. But if you’ve got both areas covered, you can
easily far outstrip your competitors who come from disciplines that
lack the proper perspective.
One of the problems is that those schools that try to teach design
don’t really have a teaching methodology for it. They have
instructors who came from the “design first” school that are limited
in their ability to design, as you say, by being very limited in
their technical facility. On the other hand, I feel that those
schools (or programs, let me use a broad brush here), that focus on
technique entirely are throwing their students into the water without
swimming lessons, teaching them how to make stuff but not where to
get ideas. Hence, their work tends to look like everyone elses, and
it generally lacks elegance because they don’t understand things
like composition, balance, negative space, the character of line,
color theory, and all those skills under the generally field of
“design” that have hundreds of years of history.
But suppose you aren’t going to go to school to learn design. Well,
you’ll have to become self taught, which is difficult but certainly
not impossible. Go to the library, not to the Internet. There are
thousands of books on design, and don’t limit yourself to jewelry
design, look at architecture, furniture design, clothing, and of
course, traditional and modern arts like painting and sculpture. Look
at what Frank Loyd Wright did with his stained glass windows, look at
what David Smith did in his “Cubi” series. And of course, look at the
jewelry of Lalique. DO NOT! peruse the trade rags. That stuff is
largely generic crap made my CAD/CAM jockeys with zero understanding
of design and even less knowledge of making jewelry.
Study nature. I mean, collect some leaves, and try to duplicate them
in metal (better to chase and repousse than to cast of electroform).
Look for ideas in unlikely places, like corn flakes. What would they
look like in gold? Draw, draw, draw, and draw some more.
On the other hand, if you’ve come from a background of design, as in
fashion, and lack technical skills, you should waste no time getting
work in a store with a good jeweler or a trade shop, because
technique is about practice. Making or fixing jewelry 40 hours a
week will make a world of difference in your abilities and in the
overall quality of your work. Well, enough for now. When I retire I
actually plan to write a book on jewelry design, since I think it’s
entirely needed. I think we need a developed methodology, with
exercises, examples, and theory.
David L. Huffman
how do you learn design? My answer is to learn technique, the design skills will follow.
david - i like this line of thought ! a person has to start some
where, if a person can learn some basic skills first a foundation
for success at a portion of the project, the technical part, will
encourage the fledgeling jeweler to keep trying
goo
But if you've got both areas covered, you can easily far outstrip your competitors who come from disciplines that lack the proper perspective.
Another thought that comes off of what many including David are
saying - there are actually two distinct aspects of design. David
calls it “technique”, I guess, but I’d say there is technique and
there is the other design.
One design is what a jewelry designer does - the rendering. The
other design is what the benchworker does (you have a bench, you’re
a benchworker).
“Here’s a piece of wire, make an elegant curve out of it”. 80% of
people will pick up a pair of pliers and bend the wire into a curve
and call it done. It’s the other 20% that you need to think about -
the ones who see beyond the wire…
It’s the exact, precise, and willful way that everything is made that
makes great jewelry great. Call it technique, call it bench design. I
like to call it “craftsmanship”. And the “You don’t need to have
skill, art is enough.” nonsense is simply that. Take the art, give it
double the craftsmanship, and it will be double the piece. As David
says, it’s the melding of the two…
When I retire I actually plan to write a book on jewelry design, since I think it's entirely needed.
Great, David, now you just have to decide how many volumes it will
be… ; }
Real jewelry is a business, no matter what genre. To be successful
requires cash flow. And sometimes that means recycling standards or
even just outright vending - buy low, sell high. Over and over again
somebody somewhere will say, “I do original work…” And I’ll look and
say, "Well, not really… Though it’s certainly very nice…
A while back I said something about how a graduate can’t know who
Lalique is, and David does, too. So many school-taught people are
taught school-taught design and only that. They don’t learn “The
Elements of Design”. Victorian, Edwardian, Nouveau, Deco, Arts and
Crafts, Contemporary, etc… And how each is done in execution, and
also a solid base of what has come before… When you get to
understand more of those things, “Original” takes on a whole
different meaning
how do you learn design? My answer is to learn technique, the design skills will follow.
Funny… I always thought of it just the opposite…
A while back I said something about how a graduate can't know who Lalique is, and David does, too. So many school-taught people are taught school-taught design and only that. They don't learn "The Elements of Design". Victorian, Edwardian, Nouveau, Deco, Arts and Crafts, Contemporary, etc.. And how each is done in execution, and also a solid base of what has come before..... When you get to understand more of those things, "Original" takes on a whole different meaning
First, John, the initial part of your statement here is a variable
thing. Art Schools inevitably include in the curriculum, a bunch of
art history courses. In some schools, this is the usual inundation of
too much boring flooding the poor students unprepared
brains, and is quickly lost. But the better jewelry programs do
include quite a bit of jewelry/craft relevant specific art history
along with the technical hands on skills. I know more
than a few art school graduates who’d know exactly what you’re
talking about in your list above, and can easily recognize the major
names and examples of those styles. Now, perhaps they haven’t studied
each in enough depth to know all the technical details of how each
style was actually executed in the workshop, but that’s beside the
point. It’s the background info needed so that students are not
spending lots of time reinventing the wheel and thinking they’re the
first to do it.
Second, it’s perhaps useful to also point out that too much of that
history can sometimes be an impediment. The art schools
emphasize to students that they should be striving to do original
work. Influenced perhaps by the they have about the
past, but then synthesizing new directions from it. Considering the
breadth and depth of our past, this can be daunting, and to some,
almost crippling. There’s so much that has already been very
thoroughly explored in the past that finding something new takes real
creativity, technical and aesthetic experience, and the confidence
to work through the initial learning years where the likelyhood of
coming up with something really new (and doing it as well as it
should be) is very slim. The lack of a good background education for
some people might be a liberating thing. In ignorance is bliss
perhaps? I know well educated jewelers who are almost frightened of
trying to find something new simply because they don’t wish to risk
doing work that could be called overly derivative or simply
reinventing the wheel. Meanwhile, I also know people who, without
that strong education, find some aspect of metals they really enjoy,
jump into it with both feet and both hands, and start cranking out
work. It may be less unique and original, but at least they’re
producing, learning in the process, and perhaps making money and
having fun. Is this bad for the field that they don’t know their own
history or where their work’s ideas come from? Is it preferable to
be one of those perhaps-too- well-educated people who finds
themselves inhibited from doing things because they know some of the
ideas are not originally their own?
Peter Rowe
how do you learn design? My answer is to learn technique, the
design skills will follow.
Funny... I always thought of it just the opposite.....
It occurs to me that the above interchange is almost a decent way to
characterize the difference between the classic apprenticeship based
european training for a goldsmith, versus the 20th century American
Art School model of training for jewelers or other artists. The
europeans taught the craft, and design was a part of the craft, often
the part learned later with experience, while the U.S. schools,
rooted in Victorian artistic ideals that had little to do with
practical training, instead taught “creativity” and design formost,
with the assumption that artists would find the needed ways to
realize their ideas…
Of course, while there’s still a bit of truth to the distinctions,
these days many art schools put a lot of effort into trying to teach
skills too, and the european schools also put a lot of training into
design now, at the same level as any U.S. school. With the old
apprentice system fading away, the distinction between the
educational models on the two sides of the atlantic is diminishing…
Peter Rowe
The lack of a good background education for some people might be a
liberating thing. In ignorance is bliss perhaps?
Peter’s post, like all his posts, is spot on as usual.
I have taught four apprentices up to trade test level and many, many
hobbyists. None of them had any formal art education, and in most
cases that stuff can come later, in my opinion.
First, teach your hands, I tell them.
Just listen and learn and DO it. Make it and put it out there, on the
Net, in the window, at the markets. Mostly, after they worked for me
for four-five years,and they done their trade test, I try to kick
them out my shop.
Ok, not kick but I try to get them a job at another jeweller. Go
learn his methods. Mine aren’t the only one and not necessarily the
best either.
Peter is absolutely correct in saying that to much schooling can be
crippling.
I have seen that in Germany for instance.
The Meister has instilled such a fear in the appie, that they just
to poep scared to try anything for themselves…
It’s all very well to twaddle on about how you been to foreign
climes and how you were taught by this method or that master. But the
bottom line is make, produce, in any metal. All the time. Never stop.
Don’t believe that gold is better or different to silver. Or that
platinum is superior to gold.
That is just scary stories in the dark.
Within slight differences, there is nothing that is made in gold
that can’t be made in silver, or brass, for that matter.
I encourage anybody I teach to copy my stuff, and I help them copy
any other persons stuff as well. Why? Because if you ask six metal
smiths to each make a ring from the same picture, you will get six
different rings. And I tell my apprentices that copyright is a load
of hogwash and usually instigated by artists of limited ability.
By the time you have pursued an alleged infringement, you can have
made a thousand different rings in a thousand different designs. Go
figure which is more profitable.
All my apprentices are self employed, because that is what I told
them I was teaching them as well.
Thing is, you got to like what you do and do it all the time. And
always, you got to make stuff, and then see if you can make money out
of it, and if that don’t work, make some other things and see if
those sell. There is no successful artist in any medium that did not
produce a boatload of art. Bottom line…
Cheers, Hans
http://www.meevis.com
I am sure that this thread could go on forever, so I won’t add any
more opinions. I also feel sorry for those seeking an apprenticeship,
I know that apprenticeships here in the UK have dwindled and I am
sure it has something to do with our government introducing the
minimum wage. When I first started my apprenticeship I was paid one
third of the basic wage of goldsmiths, a wage that increased each
year so that in my final year I was being paid three quarters of the
basic wage. I only achieved the basic wage the day after my twenty
first birthday when I finished my apprenticeship. Nowadays here in
the UK an apprentice starts work at a rate of at least 200 GBpounds
or 300 dollars a week.
I would like to thank all who have contacted me directly, either
commenting on my work or my Orchid posts. Last month Charles L.B.
contacted me asking where he could obtain a copy of my book in
Canada. At the time I suggested that he ordered one from a UK
supplier, but now I see that http://www.amazon.ca is now advertising
my book as being available from them on1st November 2009, they are
offering a good discount for pre orders if anyone in Canada is
interested.
Peace and good health to all
James Miller FIPG
The lack of a good background education for some people might be a liberating thing. In ignorance is bliss perhaps?
Peter says good things, as usual. Others have, too. For myself I
guess I should explain most of my take on this whole thread - it’s
not about art, it’s about money. Meaning Art is another topic…
Career, cash, having a car and sending your kids through college and
eating in a nice restaurant sometimes and maybe going to Hawaii
every year…
You can pound out copper rings and sell them for two bucks per and
if you sell 25,000 of them a year you’ll have a good living. Or you
can sell three diamonds and do the same. How you set those diamonds
is entirely between you and your customers. BUT - you need to rise
to the level of ability to be the person people come to for those
diamonds, and to do the work involved in making it all happen. Make
that same ring in gold and you’ll make $50 on each one… You need
to be plugged into the gold business to sell them, though.
I’ve been making jewelry for a living for just about 38 years now…
I don’t know about you all, but I just can’t sit still…