Abstracting Craft

Abstracting Craft
The Practiced Digital Hand
Malcolm McCullough, 1996
The MIT Press
Cambridge, Massachusetts
London, England

As with other books and articles on this journal I will begin by selecting quotes and key points that I think may be relevant to my critical review.

In the preface to Abstracting Craft Malcolm McCullough writes

“we have escaped that industrial age in which technology and talent were so directly opposed. In the process we are reuniting skill and intellect” (McCullough 1996)

Reading this quote made me think about the issue of access to digital technologies. Are they available to everyone who wants to use them? Are the people with access to them using them to their best advantage? McCullough defines skill as “the learned ability to do a useful process well” (McCullough 1996:3)

In chapter titled ‘A short history of craft’ McCullough writes,

“To wax poetic on a humble water jug is an act of which only the modern era could be capable - this kind of appreciation arises only against the threat of extinction” (McCullough 1996:11)

As he points out “everything used to be craft” (McCullough 1996:11), he goes onto briefly describe the relation of craft to manufacturing from the early middle ages to the end of the 20th century. McCullough concludes this chapter by stating

“One thing is clear. We have reached a point in the history of technology where it is especially important to take pride in human abilities. We must not only defend against further deskilling, but also direct inevitable technological change in a more human-centric direction.” (McCullough 1996:19)

McCullough follows this with a chapter called ‘What is craft?’ I have noticed that he is careful to define any terms he uses, such as ‘skill’ and ‘craft’. I will include my definitions of terms I am using in my critical review. McCullough writes that according to Webster the word ‘craft’ comes from the Middle English ‘craeft’ which means power or strength. This later comes to mean a specific power, then a specialized skill. McCullough goes on to define industry as the “application of technology to practical production”. He writes that “Industrial design seeks to establish aesthetics for mechanised production” (McCullough 1996:20). He explains that technology means ‘the study of skill’ in Greek, and that technique is about methods of doing things. (McCullough 1996:21).

He concludes this chapter by defining further what craft means, writing that “Craft remains skilled work applied towards practical ends” and that “Craft is the application of personal knowledge to the giving of form”. Lastly, he writes of craft that

“It remains about the individually prepared artefact, which is newly practical due to digital computing. Craft is certainly an application of skill, and it may yet involve the skilled hand” (McCullough 1996:22)

The next chapter is ’Direct Manipulation’ which McCullough explains is a term created by a software designer to describe something everyone now takes for granted, which is pointing at our work with the mouse. It refers to the combination of three activities

“(1) continuous visibility of the object of interest; (2) rapid, incremental, reversible, physical actions on the object; and (3) immediately visible results” (McCullough 1996:23).

I had never thought about this before, but as he explains direct manipulation’s capacity for ‘continuous action’ is the basis for digital craft. (McCullough 1996:23).

However, he does balance this by acknowledging that

“The fact that traditional craft endures at all is because it satisfies some deep need for direct experience - and most computers are not yet providing that experience.” (McCullough 1996:25)

I do not think that computers need to provide experience of ‘touching your work,’ this can come later in the process. McCullough goes onto describe skill in relation to using computers. He discusses the manual dexterity involved, finding mouse positions and key combinations naturally, and hand eye coordination even when the two are focused on different objects. There is also an intellectual agility which responds to the computer, “You work around problems: when one approach is blocked , you quickly find another that is open”.

“Above all you develop a contextual awareness. Like a good pianist you improve your ability to push what you have learned into a subconscious background, so that you don’t have to keep so much in mind at any one time”

He writes that you learn what tool on the computer is best to use when and how far things can be pushed. (McCullough 1996:27)

He concludes this chapter by considering the question of access, he writes that these tools have become more affordable, that computers are more human friendly, and lastly that “there is a growing appreciation of new abstractions” which means new kinds of work are possible. (McCullough 1996:28)

A whole section is devoted to eyes, which I did not understand at first but he explains their importance clearly,

“The craft artefact, always the traditional object of coordinated efforts, is therefore as much a product of the eye as of the hand” (McCullough 1996:32)

Later on in the book he returns to this subject when discussing recognition and discovery in relation to designing form on the computer, he writes “How else but with the eyes can you tell when you have found something?” (McCullough 1996:233). I think this is something else that I had taken for granted before reading this book. When I am using the computer to design forms it is my eyes that tell me when I have achieved what I set out to, or when I have come across something interesting through experimentation.

He goes on to consider the role of tools,

“A tool is a moving entity whose use is initiated and actively guided by a human being, for whom it acts as extension, towards a specific purpose” (McCullough 1996:68).

He also writes that “A tool may not only perform some action, but may also come to represent that action” (McCullough 1996:61).

“Think of a digital artefact, shaped by software operations, made up of data assemblies. Although lacking in physical substance, it is a thing with an appearance, spatiality, structure, workable properties, and a history. Although it does not bear the mark of someone’s hands, as a clay pot does, neither is it the product of a standardized industrial process” (McCullough 1996:155)

He later discusses rapid prototyping, which gives physical substance to a digital artefact. He writes,

“Like the exploration of form in geometric modelling, rapid prototyping is accelerating the ability to explore related formal possibilities, except that it is doing it in physical form” (McCullough 1996:88)

He writes that rapid prototyping is becoming cheaper and therefore more accessible. He goes so far as to say that “rapid prototyping alone should achieve stature as an expressive medium”. He continues by talking about CAD/CAM as a whole and argues that “no other equally prevalent application of computers is so closely linked to that traditional locus of artisanry: the making of three-dimensional things” (McCullough 1996:188,189). However, he concludes by writing that,

“whatever its technical balance of notation, interface and construction, the test of abstract craft will depend mostly on personal experience” (McCullough 1996:190)

McCullough next writes about medium. He writes that this can mean a class of tools and raw materials, also that “a medium receives the work of tools” it is a “range of possibilities” and that knowledge comes through involvement with it (McCullough 1996:193-196). However, he adds that a medium must have limits, “constraint is a source of strength” (McCullough 1996:200).

Later he writes about the computer as medium,

“there exists a growing possibility of constructing the experience of a medium in the world of the computer” (McCullough 1996:215)

“the intellectual ability to appreciate a medium well enough to construct a robust mental model must be acquired and maintained through learning, play, and practice” (McCullough 1996:218)

I agree with his point that playing with a medium helps you to use it well. McCullough devotes a whole chapter to the idea of ‘play’. He writes that play is simply improvisation and experimentation without risk. Recreational craft, which is constantly popular is actually productive play, this is why it is so satisfying to do.

McCullough believes that between art and industrial design lies craft,

“Where personal knowledge still combines with practical intent, where the expression is as much functional economy as aesthetic stance, where the products are individual and idiomatic, where the medium is the basis for mastery: there we find craft” (McCullough 1996:201)

I agree with lot of McCullough points, this one in particular sums up for me what I think craft should be. His next statement also seems very relevant to my work at the moment, he writes that

“Good workmanship is sympathetic to such potentials of a medium and uses any idiosyncrasies to its advantage” (McCullough 1996:201)

This is what I have been trying to do with my work, for example thinking about how I could include the marks created on my forms by the rapid prototyping machine, and the seam lines from the mould making process.

His next chapter deals with appreciation,

“The notion of artefact as translucent vessel brings forth the possibilities of latent content, which can be defined as expression neither intended by the author nor read in by the recipient, but conveyed by the cultural content under which the artefact has been produced and received” (McCullough 1996:204)

McCullough writes that the difference between traditional craft and digital craft is that with the former mistakes cannot usually be undone, actions are permanent which creates a cautiousness, in digital craft things can be reconstructed, there is an ‘undo’ button (McCullough 1996:213,214).