Page 195 - Constructing Craft

Chapter Ten: Technology and Work?

In February 1974 Craft Potters Nelson Inc became the first studio pottery co-
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operative to be established in Nelson. The club allowed members to work together,
sell their pottery in a gallery in the clubrooms and taught beginning potters. Early in

the development of the club a debate began amongst members around the
purchase of a pug mill – a machine to mix and knead clay. Jane McCallum, a club

member, explains: ‘Some people thought you should be able to work the clay
yourself. It was a club after all for learning to work with clay. And a pug mill was just

going to take over and make people lazy.’ The debate was concerned with how

much potters should do for themselves: ‘Even the potters that bought clay, and
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didn’t go out and dig it themselves, were called the Betty Crocker potters.’ The
other issue the debate raised was the sense that learning a craft was also about
learning to enjoy the ‘work’ involved in craft. The problem was technology and the

extent to which craftspeople should use machinery to make objects that could be

truly called ‘hand-made’. The philosophy that drove some of the more vocal
proponents of the need to shun machinery was not understood by many

craftspeople. Few could have clearly stated how much machinery was too much.
Better to simply avoid technology altogether. Many craftspeople also believed that

what they did and how they did it was not really work in the traditional sense at all.

‘Laziness’ therefore was a rejection of the essence of craft. The puritanical tone of
the debate was not accidental. Both technology and the true meaning of work were

subjects of considerable discussion amongst craftspeople and to some extent
defined who were ‘true’ craftspeople and who were merely playing.

Constructing Craft