I’ve followed Robin Wood for a while now.

I saw him at work at a country fair one year; that was the first time I saw a pole lathe in action, and then a year later we go to try one at uni.  Also, when we did context studies, he came up in discussion because of his use of, and support for traditional craft practice.

We actually used his work and his blog in one of our presentations, and I was curious and amused by how he lives a fairly traditional lifestyle in some ways, and yet is very active in blogging, he even used to have a picture on the website that looked as though he was camping, and yet had apple laptop on… that made me smile.

He champions traditional craft, and is one of the founding members of the Heritage Craft Association, something that he clearly feels passionate about and works hard for.

I’ve just read this evening’s post about Marcel Duschamp, and I think it makes for really interesting reading; he questions that (some) craft skills are becoming so rare that should they not be as highly valued, if not more so than “art”?  His point  that “fine art” is now taught to thousands in universities by comparison to the small number of skilled craftspeople was particularly resonant, given that the course (Crafts) I completed last year at Derby has seen it’s final year graduate this summer.

I’ve found my work, whether jewellery, wall art or glass dishes featured in Etsy Treasuries quite a lot lately – I’ve now clocked up 4 – here’s a few current ones:

So, why this sudden flurry of activity you might wonder?

A few months ago, a friend of mine started up a new forum – Craft Pimp it’s a fab place for all sorts of art and craft techniques, from glass, to ceramic, from paper to felt and fabric and much, much more.  Its a place to share work, ideas, inspirations… and everybody is so full of enthusiasm and have been having fun creating treasuries (an Etsy Treasury is a collection of up to 16 items selected from the thousands of handmade items for sale, usually themed – I personally love to see the colour collection ones) – sometimes promoting the Craft Pimp Team, but also sharing things they love from other makers on Etsy.

As a result of this, listed work gets seen by a wider audience.  Not just MY Facebook Fans, people watching MY Twitter timeline or people who have MY shop in their circle… all of those people who are in the treasury will share it with their friends, fans and followers… spreading out further.  I’ve noticed that I have been added to a couple of treasuries created by people that I have no apparent link with – they’re not glass workers, or known members of either of the forums I frequent. 

They could have simply found my work by a tag search… but they may well have found me through friends of friends of friends…. either way, it means more visitors to my Etsy Shop, more hits on my website – so, I say, bring it on!

This is actually going back to experiment some more with work I’ve ‘played’ with before – I am now looking at ways it can be displayed, put together to make pieces suitable for craft exhibitions, playing with light…

This kind of texture was on of my first encounters with glass, many moons ago – and I starting trying it with coloured glass at Uni… but other ‘stuff’ took over (namely an extremely large piece of wall art that weighed 50 kilos and was my degree show piece….

I wanted to make something for the Contemporary Craft Exhibition this weekend, that tied together the style of the ceramic wall art I’ve been doing, with the glass.  I think this may be it!  This involves the use of mirrors to accentuate the texture.

Hope people like this idea….

I’ve been featured in another treasury. It’s Easter, and my Mummy always gets me an Easter egg. We have lots of holidays, and the sun has been shining – and I think it’s gone to my head!

So, there’s 20% off all items in my Etsy store until May Day, simply use this voucher code at the checkout: ‘Maydaymadness2011’

My Etsy Shop

Happy Easter!