Taiwan Crafts  Journal

Mar. 2016 / vol.60

| Feature

The intimate relation between crafts and human beings

Traditionalcrafts were produced for the purpose of use, beauty and social values. In modern times, there are more reflections about the present day since the way people looking at themselves have changed. With the fast technological evelopments in the capitalist society, the relation between human beings and nature is very distant. The distant relation appears not only between the one of human beings and the environment but between human beings and their own bodies, minds and spirits. Through the contemporary craft creations which are close to human beings’ skin, the labor values, the relation between media and humans and the formation of self-identities can be seen and discussed again while digging up and discovering more meanings, values and possibilities of human bodies in modern times.

The Displacement between Body and Object

We might describe contemporary crafts as products that are made through multiplephysical and spiritual practices. Contemporary crafts have developed the attributes of ‘misplacement’ and ‘function-reversal’, and recent new technologies have made huge changes to the distance and relation between contemporary crafts and humanbodies. Decoration is no longer limited to specific kind of aesthetics. Decoration has become a way to convey a personal identity, and a way to tell the philosophy of life, the perspective of seeingthe world.

The avant-garde landscape of clothes: on the aesthetic inspirations of fiber art

Under the contemporary thoughts, how could CLOTHES, as the most intimate creation tohuman  bodies, manage to break the Cliché rule? And what if the basic and most important function wearing” is put aside, what would be left? In the creations inspired with modern fiber crafts, those artists do not only control the materials, sewing skills and the relationship to human bodies but also merge their personal memories and cultural stamps into the works. In that way, the clothes showunique styles, and beyond the basic functionality, clothes become the containers of personal memories, or the symbolic signs of modern times.