Textile Theory: do we need it?
Textile Theory: do we need it?
Textiles are ubiquitous, covering our bodies, adorning our homes and structuring many of the networks that make up contemporary communication. Considering this ubiquity, it is surprising that textile theory continues to be an under-explored area of academic inquiry. Where critical writing does exist about textiles, it tends to emerge from a variety of disciplines, deploying a range of critical approaches. This paper proposes a discussion of my interest in mainstream journalism and fiction as tools for discussion about contemporary textile practice.The American Janet Koplos has written: “If I were looking for a “better” crafts criticism, I would not be looking for theorizing borrowed from literature or other fields. I would be wishing not for more jargon for the right ordinary language to do the trick. I would not be hoping for critical infallibility. I would simply want better writing, showing thought and care.” My interest in fiction is less about “theorizing borrowed from literature” as Koplos warns, than it is a search for writing about textiles that shows “thought and care”, is unselfconscious, and free from the often unhelpful parameters of academic regulations.
In this paper, I propose a discussion of three types of critical writing about contemporary textile practice: 1) my experience as a freelance writer for a number of non-academic textile publications 2) my ongoing interest in the relationship between fiction as a form of critical writing about craft 3) my current research editing a reader of critical writing about textiles. Each provides there own potentials, as well as pitfalls in the contribution they can make to design criticism today. But together these three approaches may begin to suggest a new more adaptable and accessible identity for the lost profession of the design critic. ...
Presented and published in conference proceedings of Design & Craft: a history of convergences and divergences conference (ICDHS) edited by Javier Gimeno-Martinez & Fredie Floré