Diane Krys: A Show of Craft

With Craft Year 2015 in full swing here in Canada there’s lots going on in provincial Craft Councils and communities nationwide to celebrate. The Alberta Craft Council recently opened their Language of Craft group exhibit which I’m very happy to be participating in with a new piece of work.

This exhibition’s “call for entry” piqued my interest when it asked “What does Craft mean to you?” Craft is a word with a wide arc of meanings and values so the opportunity to clarify and explore my own thoughts compelled me to apply.

Even though I can be quite content to work and create in my own little nest, I push myself to invest in a small number of show opportunities that resonate and offer a seed for growth. I’ve come to realize the exhibition process is an important part of my creative development even if I don’t always make the cut.

I’m attracted to exhibits that inspire me to take my visual language in different directions and I don’t mind letting a thought provoking exhibit theme drive the bus. It was after a deeper dive into my own thoughts on Craft that I surfaced with the inspiration for the show piece, Maker’s Mark. It draws it’s title from the British practice of stamping gold and silver work to denote who made it.

Maker’s Mark,  Diane Krys, 2015  The details in a piece of Craft work are richly embedded with the unique hand and story of it’s maker. This piece may look like a cloud of white texture punctuated with splashes of colour yet on closer inspection it’s a mosaic of individual characters, each one imprinted with a fragment of myself and my experiences.

A “call for entry” can also be a call for experimentation. This concept for this piece challenged me to work with a large number of multiples, 100 to be exact, and to build a flexible sculpture that allowed for different configurations.  Future explorations are percolating.

Since I do work quite independently exhibiting feels like taking a field trip complete with a party a.k.a. an artist’s reception where I can connect with other artists, friends, family and interested viewers.  Participating in a show creates a different kind of dialogue for me and my work.  I delight in those moments when this new context has me seeing things in a new light.

I’ll leave you with a few quotes from the show and a question…What does Craft mean to you?

Related links:

Alberta Craft Council’s Language of Craft

Craft Year 2015

Thanks for stopping in- see you next month!