Notice Board

Frank Lloyd Wright’s address ‘The Art and Craft of the Machine’ is widely remembered as an early manifesto for the modern movement in its embrace of the machine-made simplicity. However, Wright’s concept of the ‘Machine’ was influenced by Louis Sullivan’s organic theories of architecture which combined Victorian science and idealism. An acknowledgement that Wright’s ‘Machine’ is also metaphysical, the ‘Will of Life’, resituates his characterization of the arts and crafts as anachronistic and elitist. Furthermore, Wright delivered his speech at Hull House, and directed much of his criticism at the social settlement workers, and indirectly at their neighbours, many of whom participated in craft activities after working on machines all day long. Ellen Gates Starr, bookbinder and co-founder of Hull House, responded to Wright’s address and agreed that handwork and social work are not synonymous, and made clear that neither she, nor other members of the Chicago Arts and Crafts Society (CACS), are against the machine. Starr’s insight drew upon the conditions of contemporary industrial society, while Wright’s conception was based on the power of individual genius. This complicates the persistent narrative that the arts and crafts movement failed because its practitioners made expensive, hand-crafted items and refused to embrace standardization.

Sarah Alford graduated from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, with an MA in Visual and Critical Studies, and an MFA in Fiber and Material Studies. She has exhibited across Canada, and in the United States, including the Museum of Arts and Design in New York and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. Alford has received grants to study craft and craft history from Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, the Canada-US Fulbright Program and the Center for Craft Creativity and Design in North Carolina. She is currently a PhD candidate at Queen’s University in Art History and Art Conservation.