Page 227 - Constructing Craft

Paul Johnson

Commenting on the clay-work of Paul Johnson, David Clegg, a New Plymouth

based craft artist, pointed out that Johnson, with his ‘working drawings, site
photographs, scale models (often [with] two potential solutions to a problem) and

coloured photographs of the installed commission’ worked more like Clegg himself
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who was involved with architectural stained glass. But he had a warning for
craftspeople.

Architectural crafts [sic] does not mean simply an extra large
pot or hanging but rather an artwork selected to relate on equal
terms with all the other elements within a given space. It means
involving artists in glass, ceramics, wood, wrought-iron and
textiles in the building design process. These crafts are part of
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the building, not whimsical (or desperate) additions.

He said of Johnson: ‘Paul says he is not a potter, he does not make pots. While that

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is true, he certainly knows how to.’ His message was that the market was
changing and craftspeople could not expect to make what they liked and hope that
a corporation would buy it. Clegg was unsure if the time was yet right – ‘New

Zealand architecture in general has still to outgrow the catalogue-purchased ethic
that evolved in the 60’s and dominated the 70’s’ – but he was convinced that

craftspeople needed to adapt: ‘As always, New Zealand will come to accept such

radical shifts in direction with much kicking, screaming and persecution of its early
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proponents.’

Constructing Craft