CRAFTIVISM
A MANIFESTO/METHODOLOGY
TAL FITZPATRICK
© Tal Fitzpatrick 2018
SECOND EDITION
ABOUT THIS HANDBOOK
Whether you are dabbling in craftivism for the first time or are a seasoned
craftivist, this craftivism manifesto/methodology handbook is designed to
help you think deeply about your practice. Beginning with a manifesto that
sets out the ethos of craftivism, this handbook goes on to define craftivism
and provide a set of considerations, strategies and tools designed to help
readers develop greater reflexivity and confidence in their practice.
This handbook was created as part of Tal Fitzpatrick’s practice-led PhD
research into craftivism as a mode of DIY citizenship. It was first made
publicly available in at Tal’s PhD exhibition ‘Craftivism HQ’ which was held
between the 7-10 March 2018 at KINGS Artist Run gallery in Melbourne,
Australia. This publication is the second edition of this craftivism manifesto/
methodology, if you have any thoughts about how this handbook could be
improved your feedback would be welcomed.
Cover image by Tal Fitzpatrick. Photo taken Tiffaney Bishop during Tal's participatory performance
of the making of the 'PM Please' quilt, hillsceneLIVE art festival in Monbulk, VIC 2015.
WE THE CRAFTIVISTS: A MANIFESTO
No longer will we be okay with benefiting from the oppression of the other.
No more will we tolerate patriarchal, colonial systems of oppression,
nor toxic masculinity or white supremacy loosely veiled.
No more will we remain silent, complicit.
We stand against artificial hierarchies
and histories of hate.
We are the craftivists.
A patchwork of makers, diverse but united in kinship.
We stand for justice, universally applied.
Through our craft we bear witness.
With our skilled hands and compassionate hearts, we mend the tears in the
fabric of our society.
We make to make connections. We make to raise each other up.
We make to make a difference.
We make to make change.
We resist.
1
IF YOU’RE NOT ANGRY, YOU’RE NOT PAYING ATTENTION
More often than not we come to activism from a place of anger. Anger about
the destruction of the environment, the oppression of others, the abuse of
power, the lack of justice, the violation of rights, and the inhumanity of
bureaucracies. Anger in the face of injustice is a powerful and justified
emotion, able to galvanise and mobilise large groups of people quickly.
However, anger is not a sustainable driver for achieving non-violent longlasting positive change. For this reason, the majority of craftivists advocate
using craft as a method to transform anger into something else… Something
curious that prompts people to engage in complex conversations, something
that uses humour and irony to make people consider a different point of
view, something that inspires the kind of love and generosity that gets people
to open their hearts and change their minds, something pragmatic that
provides practical solutions to local problems.
In saying that, engaging in tone policing – for example, by telling activists
not to be so angry all the time – is counterproductive as it works to derail
entire conversations by critiquing and dismissing the emotionality of a
message rather than engaging with the message itself.[1] So, if anger is what
you feel, then power to you! Hopefully, craftivism might help you channel
that anger into something generative that will help sustain you and support
others.
[1] Robot Hugs, No, We Won’t Calm Down – Tone Policing Is Just Another Way to Protect
Privilege, (December 7, 2015) https://everydayfeminism.com/2015/12/tone-policing-andprivilege/ accessed 12 July 2017.
2
DEFINING CRAFTIVISM
The term ‘craftivism’ was originally coined by writer and maker Betsy Greer
in 2003.[2] Greer provides a very broad definition for the term, writing that
craftivism is ‘…a way of looking at life where voicing opinions through
creativity makes your voice stronger, your compassion deeper & your quest
for justice more infinite.’[3] As part of my PhD research into craftivism I
developed a more specific definition of the term:
Craftivism is both a strategy for non-violent activism and a
mode of DIY citizenship that looks to influence positive
social and political change. This uniquely 21st Century
practice involves the combination of craft techniques with
elements of social and/or digital engagement as part of a
proactive effort to bring attention to, or pragmatically
address, issues of social, political and environmental justice.
Craftivism can take the form of acts of donation,
beautification, notification or be deployed for its individual
capacity building and therapeutic benefits, or for its ability
to strengthen social connections and enhance community
resilience.
[2] Betsy Greer, Craftivism, (August 18, 2017) http://craftivism.com accessed 20 June 2017.
[3] Betsy Greer, Craftivism, (August 18, 2017) http://craftivism.com/definition/ accessed 20
June 2017.
3
THE HISTORY OF CRAFT/ACTIVISM
The use of craft for the purpose of activism has been practiced throughout
modern history by activists, feminists and anarchists right across the globe.
Notable historical examples of craft being deployed as a strategy for
activism include the use of ‘domestic arts’ within the women’s suffrage
movement,[4] Mahatma Gandhi’s strategy of hand spinning his own
traditional garments as a way to demonstrate his rejection of Western culture
in the 1930’s,[5] and the Freedom Quilting Bee of Rehoboth, Alabama,
which was central for enabling the African American women involved to
become financially independent and join the fight for civil rights in the mid
1960’s.[6] Other important examples include the Chilean Arpilleras, women
who documented life under a military dictatorship using appliqué and
embroidery techniques to record the stories of people who disappeared
under the Pinochet government in the 1980’s,[7] the political and
commemorative textiles of West Africa through which citizens comment on,
share and record history as it unfolds,[8] and the Names AIDS memorial
Quilt which to date remains the largest community art project in the world
(1987 - ongoing).[9] Take time to research and be inspired by craft’s rich
rebellious history, and draw upon the ways craft has previously been used as
a strategy for resistance within your own country/culture/community.
[4] Eileen Wheeler, "The Political Stitch: Voicing Resistance in a Suffrage Textile" Textile Society
of America Symposium Proceedings 758. September 2012, http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/
viewcontent.cgi?article=1757&context=tsaconf accessed 18 December 2017.
[5] Theodore M. Brown and Elizabeth Fee, “Spinning for India’s Independence,” Am J Public
Health, no.98. 2008, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2156064/ accessed 18
December 2017.
[6] Nancy Callahan, “Freedom Quilting Bee,” Encyclopaedia of Alabama, August 2008,
http://www.encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/h-1628 accessed 12 January 2018.
[7] “Arpillera: The Cloth of Resistance” Royal Albert Museum, http://
www.royalalbertamuseum.ca/exhibits/online/arpillera/index.cfm 12 January 2018.
[8] Willard, Michelle, "History of Research on African Factory-Printed Cloth and Current
Approaches in the Field," Textile Society of America Symposium Proceedings, Paper 447,
2004, http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/tsaconf/447 12 January 2018.
[9] “The AIDS Memorial quilt,” About the AIDS Memorial quilt, http://www.aidsquilt.org 12
January 2018.
4
CRAFT AND FEMINISM
Since the earliest moments of the feminism movement, craft practices
traditionally associated with ‘domesticity’ and ‘femininity’ have been used by
women, gay men, and gender non-conforming people as a strategy for
challenging and subverting patriarchal power structures and for pushing
against normative understandings of gender and sexuality. Craft has been
deployed by generations of feminists as a tool for engagement, education,
individual empowerment, and consciousness raising. This includes using craft
as a strategy for helping women publicly voice their concerns, bringing
attention to the value of women’s labour, building and strengthening
communities, challenging hierarchies that value art over craft, and recording
stories/histories of individuals or communities that would otherwise go
undocumented.
The practice of craftivism is grounded in and contextualised by this feminist
history of using craft as a way to challenge the status quo. It draws directly
from the politics of third-wave feminism and can be understood as being
closely aligned with the practices of fourth-wave feminists who focus on issues
of social justice and civil rights, and rely heavily on new technologies and
social media. Gaining an understanding of the values, goals and strategies
of feminism would be beneficial for any craftivist who wants to develop a
more critical, effective and ethical practice. Take time to learn about this
important social movement, including contemporary feminist thinking about
intersectionality and queer theory. This will help ensure your projects are
inclusive and reflect a level of care and respect for all humankind, as well as
for other living creatures and the planet more broadly.
5
CHANGE STARTS WITH ONE
Craftivism is a practice built on the appreciation that change starts with one.
That change is something that each citizen is able to contribute to by doing
their part, however small. For this reason, craftivists approach change as an
everyday process that begins when people learn to alter their own habits and
beliefs, and spreads as a result of people's material actions and interventions
into private, public, institutional and online spaces. The collective result of
these interventions is that together, through the collective actions of citizens,
sustainable change becomes possible.
Craftivists use craft as a strategy for undertaking these interventions because
the experience of making something by hand reminds us that we are
powerful, creative agents capable of reshaping the world around us. As
Betsy Greer explains, ‘The creation of things by hand leads to a better
understanding of democracy, because it reminds us that we have
power.’[10] In other words, craft’s ability to empower us by making us
aware of our own individual agency teaches us that we are capable of
transforming the world around us for the better. When people learn that they
are capable of reshaping the world around them, they gain a greater
appreciation of their responsibility to use this power to make a positive
difference.[11] For this reason, craftivism has evolved to inspire people to
find ways to act on their values by materially intervening in the world through
craft.
[10] Greer, Betsy ed., Craftivism: The art of craft and activism, (Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press,
2014).
[11] Matthey Crawford, Manual Competence, TEDx talks (9 May 2011) accessed from: https://
www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdGky1JZovg accessed 12 October 2017.
6
CRAFTIVISM AS A MODE OF DIY CITIZENSHIP
Democracy is not a static system of governance but, as French philosopher
Jacques Rancière points out, a practice which must be continually performed
and comes into being through the participation of citizens.[12] The practice
of democracy involves citizens actively shaping, changing and reconstructing
themselves and the world around them in creative ways that challenge the
status quo and subvert normative understandings of ‘how things must be’.[13]
Craftivism can be deployed as a strategy to help citizens do this because it
provides people with a set of tools and strategies which they can use to find
solutions to problems themselves and change things in the here and now,
independent of the current political system.[14]
[12] Jacques Rancière, Moments Politiques: Interventions 1977-2009, trans. Mary Foster, (New
York, Oakland: Seven Stories Press, 2014), ix.
[13] Matt Ratto and Megan Boler, DIY Citizenship: Critical Making and Social Media,
(London: The MIT Press, 2014), 5.
[14] Matt Ratto and Megan Boler, DIY Citizenship: Critical Making and Social Media,
(London: The MIT Press, 2014), 104.
7
POLITICAL INTENTION
Depending on what kind of impact you wish your project to have, you will
need to adjust how subtle or overt your political messages is. In setting your
political intention consider: what are you hoping to achieve through this
craftivism project? Is it about creating the opportunity for people to voice
their own political beliefs, or is it more about you expressing your own
political opinions? If you are hoping to engage diverse groups of people in
conversation then it is important to leave room for ambiguity, this way other
people will be more likely to share their own opinions with you. If your
project is designed to help you express your own political opinion, then you
can be as politically explicit as you want.
8
SCALE AND SCALABILITY
Craftivist gestures can happen at a range of different scales: from very small
one-off private actions, to collaborative and participatory projects, to large
scale permanent public programs. The scale you choose to work at should
depend on what it is you are trying to achieve. Are you looking to raise
awareness about an issue or organisation? Are you trying to raise funds for a
specific cause? Is there something pragmatic you are trying to achieve? Or,
do you simply want to express your own political opinions in such a way that
might inspire other like minded people?
When starting out on your craftivism journey it is a good idea to focus your
energy on a single issue or cause and set yourself a goal that is aspirational
but achievable. The strategy of thinking globally and acting locally is always
useful. Try to experiment with different project ideas to to see what really
resonates with people. Then you can decide how you might increase the
scale of your project in order to reach a broader audience or increase the
impact of your work. Another strategy you can use to increase the scope of
your craftivism projects is to share them with other craftivists as models that
they could adapt and deliver in their own communities. This way your project
will continue to grow, spread and evolve far beyond the scope of your
original idea.
9
START BY LISTENING
Whatever issue or cause you have chosen to focus your craftivism on,
whether it is homelessness, domestic violence, racism, environmental
refugees, etc. it is your responsibility to learn as much as you can about that
issue before staring your project. This way you will avoid making harmful
assumptions about people, or about what exactly needs to change.
To understand how you can best use your craftivism practice in order to
bring about change, whenever possible, try reaching out to the real experts the people who have firsthand experience of the issue. As part of this process
of discovery, you must learn to listen without judgment. This means listening
with the intent of learning rather than just waiting for your turn to speak. As
part of this process you need to be prepared to be turned away, to have
your privilege challenged, to have complex uncomfortable conversations and
to totally change your approach in response to what you’ve learned. This
won’t always be easy, but at the end of the day your craftivism projects will
be more ethical and more effective because you took the time to properly
understand the issue at hand.
10
MOVING FROM DISCUSSION TO ACTION
Having done your research into the issue you are passionate about and,
where possible, developed relationships with the people facing the issues
firsthand, the next thing to consider is what tangible action you can take in
order to move from discussion to action. One of craftivism’s greatest strengths
is that it revolves around the physical act of making and therefore it prompts
us to move from discussion to action in a very pragmatic way.
When developing your projects, find ways to move beyond metaphor,
symbolism and critique in favour of pragmatic interventions that provide
concrete models for how things could be different/better. Consider: How is
change being initiated? What can you do to catalyse tangible outcomes
through your creative work? What material models for non-violent resistance
are you providing? Also, don’t be afraid to ask people: What kind of support
do you need? What is the change you wish to see? Knowledge is power and
by increasing your understanding of an issue while at the same time growing
your networks, you will increase your sphere of influence and improve your
capacity to effect change.
11
VALUE ADD
In our urgency to address the social, political and environmental issues we
are passionate about, we often fail to take the time to stop and look around
in order to see who else is working to address these same issues. Before you
reinvent the wheel, consider: in what way could you use your creative skills,
your public platform or your networks in order to add value to the work being
done by other craftivists, activists, community groups, charities or nongovernment organisations?
12
TAKE YOUR TIME
Change takes time, which is why craftivism is all about taking things slowly.
The process of making something by hand provides us with the time and
space necessary to think deeply about the issues we are concerned about.
Taking things slowly also means that when we work in collaboration with
others we are creating time and space to get to know one another. In this
space it becomes possible to have more nuanced and impactful conversations
about the issues we are passionate about.
Audiences are able to recognise the time and care you invest in your
craftivism projects, meaning that the time and care you take in making your
craftivist objects becomes embedded in the finished piece. The result of this is
that audiences are more likely to take time to view/touch/experience your
work and reflect on the political intention behind it. This is why so many
craftivists work using time consuming, embodied craft techniques.
13
PLAY
Play is a type of exploration, a methodology for learning, that people of all
ages, backgrounds and abilities can engage in. Just because the issues you
are working on are serious doesn’t mean your creative practice has to be.
Engaging
people
in
large
complex
social,
political,
cultural
and
environmental issues can be incredibly challenging, but if you can make
changing the world seem like fun both for yourself and for others, then more
people are likely to engage with your work.
Craftivism gives you the unique opportunity to be playful in your activism and
DIY citizenship. It does this by enabling us to physically play with materials,
and by providing us with endless opportunities to contrast the associations
attached to the medium we choose to create in with our own political
messages. Making use of craft’s inherent playful logic is an effective way to
disarm audiences and to spark their curiosity. So, whenever you can, tap into
craft’s potential to be humorous, ironic, excessive, cheeky, decorative, kind,
kitsch, familiar and feminine to your advantage.
14
GET QUEER, GET INTERSECTIONAL
As the majority of craftivists work in textile-based craft practices traditionally
associated with ‘women’s work’ one thing that craftivists must always be wary
of is not to reinforce regressive normative gender roles. Being conscious of
craft’s gendered histories is not enough to avoid perpetuating these histories
forward. In order to really challenge patriarchal ideas and values craftivists
must be willing to challenge, push and break stereotypical notions of gender,
sexuality and the distribution of labour through their work.
It is also important that the craftivist community makes room for, and
celebrates, diversity. Each of us can work towards this in our individual
practice by looking for ways to engage with and amplify the voices of people
from diverse backgrounds, including people of colour, first nations people,
people who identify as LGBTQIA+, and people from different class, racial,
ability, religion, ethnic and linguistic backgrounds from our own.
15
DISSENSUS
Politics proper is a process of opening-out issues to conflict, disagreement,
and alternative framing of socio-political relations.[15] For our societies to
flourish we need spaces where it is safe for us to come together in order to
share and discuss our thoughts and opinions honestly. The process of
opening out issues to conflict, disagreement and alternative framings is one
we often avoid, yet it can be extremely generative, enlightening and
transformative.
Craftivism, like other forms of socially engaged practice, has a tendency to
focus too heavily on consensus and conviviality and as a result it often
forecloses opportunities to engage in the political. In order to disrupt the
status quo and subvert normative understandings of ‘how things must be’ it is
necessary to become comfortable with creating dissensus. Dissensus is more
than just disagreement, it is about consciously making the invisible visible; it
is about voicing that which would otherwise go unsaid; it is about bringing
attention to stories that have been marginalised or silenced; it is about
centering the people who have been kept out of the conversation; It is about
making the private, public. In all your projects, consider how you can create
opportunities for dissensus to emerge and be revealed.
[15] Judith Tsouvalis and Claire Waterton, Connected Communities: Public Participation as a
Process of De-politicization, (2012), 5. http://www.ahrc.ac.uk/documents/project-reports-andreviews/connected-communities/public-participation-as-a-process-of-de-politicization/ accessed 3
November 2017.
16
COLLABORATE / CO-CREATE
Why do-it-yourself when you can do-it-together? The practice of craftivism can
be used to create unique opportunities to engage and collaborate with others.
By working with other craftivists, makers, activists, community groups, nonprofit organisations, cultural institutions, local government or even business it
is possible to maximise the impact and scope of craftivism projects, as well as
develop more ambitious projects.
However, before you start working on collaborative projects there are a few
things you need to consider. These include how your collaborative projects
will be managed, what is expected of each collaborator, and how you are
going to manage questions of authorship and ownership in an ethical way.
Transparency and up-front disclosure about these sorts of issues are critical for
establishing and maintaining healthy, reciprocal working relationships.
When collaborating with others, and when developing socially engaged and
participatory craftivism projects, it is important to consider how you can
minimise barriers to entry (whether real or perceived) in order to ensure your
projects are inclusive. Consider: can you offer basic skills training for people
who are new to craft? Do you need to provide resources/materials to
participants in order to ensure those who do not have/can’t afford their own
materials? Can you hold the project somewhere that is accessible by public
transport and is accessible for people with disabilities? Something as small as
communicating that bathroom facilities at your workshop will be gender
neutral can make a world of difference.
17
MATERIAL MATTERS
The material choices you make as part of your craftivism work matter. They
are ethical choices, choices about what systems of production and
consumption you support, choices about what stories you want to tell and
what histories you are drawing on in order to tell them.
Furthermore, the physical properties of materials shape our work. The
materials we use influence how our craft objects are read and perceived.
Materials can be read like symbols, they trigger different associations,
emotions and memories. Often the materials we work with surprise us by
rejecting our will, forcing us to reconsider and renegotiate our original vision.
For all these reasons materials are our co-creators.
As part of your craftivist practice, consider carefully the materials you choose
to work with. Consider their journey to you, and their journey ahead. Your
material choices are a material manifestation of your political principles, they
are an opportunity to act on your values. Think carefully about how you can
reduce, reuse, recycle, up-cycle and repurpose materials in your craftivism
projects.
18
THE POWER OF THE GIFT
Gift giving is a powerful strategy for forging meaningful, reciprocal, long
lasting relationships. Unlike currency-based exchanges of goods and
services, where all obligations are met at the point of payment, the nature of
the gift is such that recipients are obliged not only to receive, but to
reciprocate in some way.[16] Unlike charity which often does more to
absolve the giver of guilt than it does to achieve meaningful change or
facilitate the building of relationships, the act of giving, receiving and
reciprocating over time leads to the building of trust and connection.
As a strategy for change-making, gift-giving creates opportunities to connect
with people, including potential collaborators or community partners, or even
people in positions of power with whom you wish to start a conversation.
Importantly for craftivists, the gifting of a hand-crafted object is a gesture that
is even more powerful than the gifting of store-bought items. Hand crafted
objects carry the weight of the maker’s intention and are imbued with their
essence thanks to the time and care they dedicated to making. Stitch by
stitch, the time, care, kindness, love and humour of the maker transforms craft
materials into treasured objects that cannot be easily ignored.
[16] Marcel Mauss, The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies, (New
York, London: W.W. Norton, 1990), 39.
19
SOCIAL MEDIA
The craftivism movement was born, galvanised and spread thanks to online
digital spaces. Using new technologies and social media platforms such as
blogs, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest, craftivists across the globe
are able communicate with one another, learn new skills, connect with
potential collaborators, coordinate projects, invite social engagement, share
patterns and projects and reach wider audiences. Social media also enables
craftivists to take part in critical conversations that help enrich the practice of
craftivism.
Incorporating the use of new media into your craftivism practice can
significantly increase your ability to reach and affect people at every stage of
your process. When designing your craftivism projects, consider how you
can most effectively use online tools and social media platforms in order to
engage, connect, document and share your craftivism practice.
20
CRAFTIVIST AS FACILITATOR
Playing the role of facilitator enables you to encourage other people to share
their thoughts, opinions and ideas and create opportunities for the emergence
of new communities (temporary or otherwise). A good facilitator is able to
create safe and inclusive spaces in which groups can have complex
dissensual conversations without those conversations being derailed or
becoming adversarial.
In taking on the role of facilitator you can work with people to find common
ground – whether that be a shared vision or simply the shared experience of
making. As a facilitator your job is to provide a framework within which
people can be creative and honest. The material-discursive spaces you create
should be thought of as sites of empowerment where people feel free to
collectively explore who they are and who they can be, and in the process
become agents in the production of themselves.[17] These sites become
transformative spaces where ideas about how the world could be different
are materialised, even if only temporarily. These experiences of difference
become models on which we can base our future efforts to reshape the
world.
[17] Nato Thompson, Seeing Power: Art and Activism in the 21st Century, (Brooklyn London:
Melville House Printing, 2015), 137.
21
MAKING IS CONNECTING
Making is connecting because in order to make something new you must be
able to connect physical materials, technical skills and abstract ideas in novel
ways.[18] Even if what you make is not new, but a recreation/reiteration/
appropriation of an existing object or project, through the act of sharing
what you make, or through the process of collaborating with others in order
to make it, you are forging connections in the social, material and digital
worlds. The connections we make through making, with the material world
and with one another, have the power to tear down the walls that separate
our communities and bridge the gaps in our understanding that keep us wary
of one another. In this way making connections is making change.
[18] David Gauntlett, Making is Connecting: The Social Meaning Of Creativity, From DIY and
Knitting to YouTube and Web 2.0 (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2011), 2.
22
SHARE YOUR PLATFORM WITH OTHERS
Your craftivist practice is a platform you can share with others. As part of
your process, you will collaborate with other makers, you will partner with
community groups and organisations and you will make connections with
people who have lived experience and expertise in the issues you’re
passionate or concerned about. Consider how you can use your platform,
including your online networks and your ability to attract media attention
through your work, to bring attention to the stories and messages of other
people who need to be heard. Sharing your platform with others is an
effective strategy for allowing dissensus to emerge. Consider how you can
create opportunities for people to represent or redefine themselves by telling
their own stories via your platform rather than speaking on their behalf.
23
APPROPRIATION
In the craft community there is a long tradition of people sharing patterns and
techniques and appropriating directly from one another in order to recreate a
specific object or deliver a project in a new context. This openness to
repetition and appropriation is one of the most efficient and organic ways
that craftivist projects and ideas spread. Yet, despite this open-source culture,
it is still important to make sure you take the time to properly credit the
people who inspire you, as well as consider carefully whether appropriation
is appropriate, particularly in cases where you are adopting features from a
culture you know little about.
To avoid misappropriation of other cultures, consider: are you appreciating
and enriching the culture, or are you leeching off it, profiting from it,
exploiting it for your own means, or using it as a punchline to a joke?[19] If
you have any doubt about whether appropriating something is appropriate
or not, you can either have a conversation with the person/community from
whom you are drawing inspiration in order to get their approval, or make the
ethical choice not to appropriate from a culture that is not your own.
[19] Lucy Bealing, Staying in Your Lane: A White Person’s guide for White People, (29 June
2016) https://lucywriteswords.wordpress.com/2016/06/29/staying-in-your-lane-a-white-personsguide-for-white-people/ accessed 25 August 2017.
24
MEASURING IMPACT
Measuring the progress of change at the macro scale can seem impossible
when you are working at the micro scale of the everyday. However, our
interventions big and small do contribute toward change. The key to gaining
an appreciation of the impact of your work is to become attentive to the
patterns of difference that emerge as the ripples your work create emanate
outwards through the world. Consider: what were the tangible outcomes of
your work? What did you make/learn/contribute? What new connections or
relationships did you build through your work? Did your project inspire
anyone else to engage/reflect/grow or change their opinion? Have you
created opportunities for further engagement or for future projects to occur?
Finally, remember that often the biggest impact of your work is something you
could never have anticipated, and that you often learn more from your
failures than your successes. The key is to reflect on the lessons you learn and
integrate these into future projects. Every project you embark on is just a step
along your journey, so while you may not have reached your desired
destination, as long as you’re moving in the right direction, you are on your
way. Always try to be as kind, generous and forgiving of yourself as you
endeavour to be towards others, and don’t give up hope – for as Martin
Luther King said: 'The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward
justice.'
25
BIBLIOGRAPHY
>“Arpillera: The Cloth of Resistance” Royal Albert Museum, http://www.royalalbertamuseum.ca/
exhibits/online/arpillera/index.cfm 12 January 2018.
>“The AIDS Memorial quilt,” About the AIDS Memorial quilt, http://www.aidsquilt.org 12 January
2018.
>Betsy Greer (ed.), Craftivism: The art of craft and activism, (Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2014)
>Betsy Greer, Craftivism, (August 18, 2017) accessed from: http://craftivism.com accessed on 20
June 2017.
>David Gauntlett, Making is Connecting: The Social Meaning Of Creativity, From DIY and Knitting
to YouTube and Web 2.0, (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2011).
>Eileen Wheeler, "The Political Stitch: Voicing Resistance in a Suffrage Textile" Textile Society of
America Symposium Proceedings 758. September 2012, http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/
viewcontent.cgi?article=1757&context=tsaconf accessed 18 December 2017.
>Jacques Rancière, Dissensus: on Politics and Aesthetics, trans. Steven Corcoran ed. (New York,
London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2010).
>Jacques Rancière, Moments Politiques: Interventions 1977-2009, trans. Mary Foster, (New York,
Oakland: Seven Stories Press, 2014).
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2017.
>Karen Barad, Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter
and Meaning, (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2007).
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>Marcel Mauss, The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies, (New York,
London: W.W. Norton, 1990).
>Matt Ratto and Megan Boler, DIY Citizenship: Critical Making and Social Media, (London: The
MIT Press, 2014).
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watch?v=xdGky1JZovg accessed 12 October 2017.
>Nancy Callahan, “Freedom Quilting Bee,” Encyclopaedia of Alabama, August 2008, http://
www.encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/h-1628 accessed 12 January 2018.
>Nato Thompson, Seeing Power: Art and Activism in the 21st Century, (Brooklyn London: Melville
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>Robot Hugs, No, We Won’t Calm Down – Tone Policing Is Just Another Way to Protect Privilege,
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26
RECOMMENDED READINGS
> A Little Book of Craftivism (2013) by Sarah Corbett
> And Still We Rise: Race, Culture and Visual Conversations (2015) by Carolyn
L.Mazloomi
> Artificial Hells: Participatory Art and the Politics of Spectatorship (2012) by Claire
Bishop
> Civic Actions: Artists Practices Beyond the Museum (2017) edited by Blair French
and Anne Loxley
> Collaboration Through Craft (2013) edited by Amanda Ravetz, Alice Kettle and
Helen Felcey
> Craft Activism: People, Ideas, and Projects from the New Community of Handmade
and How You Can Join In (2011) by Joan Tabber
> Craftivism: The Art of craft and Activism (2014) edited by Betsy Greer
> Cut Cloth: Contemporary Textiles and Feminism (2017) edited by Sarah-Joy Ford
> DIY Citizenship: Critical Making and Social Media (2014) edited by Matt Ratto and
Megan Boler
> Extra/Ordinary: Craft and Contemporary Art (2011) edited by Maria Elena Buszek
> How to be a Craftivist: The Gentle Art of Protest (2017) by Sarah Corbett
> Living as Form: Socially Engaged Art from 1991-2011 (2012) edited by Nato
Thompson
> Making is Connecting: The Social Meaning of Creativity, from DIY and Knitting to
Youtube and Web 2.0 (2011) by David Gauntlett
> Queer Threads: Crafting Identity and Community (2017) by John Chaich and Todd
Oldham
> Quilts and Human Rights (2016) by Marsha Macdowell, Mary Worrall, Lynne
Swanson, and Beth Donaldson
> Seeing Power: Art and Activism in the 21st Century (2015) by Nato Thompson
> Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry into the value of work (2010) by Matthew B.
Crawford
> Strange Material: Storytelling through Textiles (2014) by Leanne Prain
> Street Craft (2015) by Riikka Kuittinen
> The New Rules of Public Art (2013) by Situations Trust and Claire Doherty
> The Textile Reader (2012) edited by Jessica Hemmings
> The Subversive Stitch: Embroidery and the Making of the Feminine (1984) by
Rozsika Parker
> Thinking Through Craft (2007) by Glenn Adamson
> Tinkering: Australian Reinvent DIY Culture (2017) by Katherine Wilson
> Yarn Bombing: The Art of Crochet and Knit Graffiti (2009) by Mandy Moore and
Leanne Prain
27
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Tal Fitzpatrick is an Israeli born artist, craftivist, feminist, researcher and
community development worker based in Melbourne, Australia. Tal received
a Bachelor of Arts degree with first class honours from Griffith University
(2006-2010) and went on to undertake a practice-led PhD with the Center
for Cultural Partnerships at the Victorian College of the Arts, University of
Melbourne (2014-2018). Her PhD research was supported by the Australian
Graduate Research Training Program Scholarship.
Driven by the power of craft to solicit the sharing of stories, Tal's work looks
to drive social change by engaging diverse groups of people in complex
conversations. Her practice-led PhD project 'Craftivism as DIY Citizenship:
The Practice of Making Change' explores the political efficacy of using craft
as a strategy for activism and advocacy. In addition to this, Tal is a
published author with extensive experience working in the non-profit sector
as a community development worker and adult educator, specialising in
community disaster resilience building and cultural development.
www.talfitzpatrick.com |@talfitzpatrick
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BE COOL | BE KIND