An important activity for me at this point in my life is the ability to create. This means making tangible “artsy stuff” that didn’t exist until I make it. The process of taking various materials and using my abilities and thoughts to make them become more than they were or something different, is a great reason for living.

I am not saying the ONLY reason, but a good one. I have many reason for living, but in this blog I write about what I create in the studio or workshop. My life interests are more than one-dimensional. Probably why I enjoy 3D creativity so much, Ha!

Making objects from wood and metal is a three-dimensional activity. However, my son recently showed me a two-dimensional watercolor painting I did years ago. The subject was a three-dimensional farm road scene. So, I can include artistic drawing as one of my creative likes. I have no hardened rules. I will create whatever interests me and that includes a lot of things.

There may be a line somewhere between a craft and an art. If there is, it is a very subjective line. Perhaps art has more “decoration”. But that is not the only factor. Form and function without decoration can also be art.

Many years I assisted in the operation of an Arts and Crafts festival my Rotary Club sponsored every year. Sometimes (every time?) an adamant “artist” would come forward and draw a “battle line” between art and craft areas.

Primarily, this “pure artist” didn’t want to “associate” or be in the same area with the crafts people. An artistic caste system. The innuendo of, “I am a better and a more ‘pure’ artist than a crafts-person,” is an unfortunate egocentric human character flaw.

Frankly, I don’t give a flying fortress. I judge art on its own merit, not the name or pedigree of the person who created it. There is as much opportunity for art in crafts as there is craft in art.

The Rotary club completely understood the issue and always made suitable accommodations. It’s all about differences, petty and great, that keep an art-craft festival interesting. Great teams (and festivals) are not built with members of equal skills and abilities. Different strokes for different folks. The festival did and does not challenge human nature. Hey! It’s called an Art’s and Crafts festival… it’s all about the show, not turf wars and identity crisis.

It’s true there can be a difference in ability and quality of work. I could consider a well-designed and executed wood chair as art. A rough cut-out plywood shadow figure “lawn art” may also be art, but of a totally different kind.

I understand difference of subject matter and media. That is what art-craft is about. I participate in what I call my craft of making things in any form I desire. I reserve the right to personally judge the good, the bad, and the plain ugly… I can produce all three.

Art is simply a non tangible personal descriptive opinion. Like pornography or art, you know it when you see it. Ha!