RosettaStone: CRAFT A primary, secondary, and annotated source reader for functional craft. By: Randi O'Brien

This is an annotated evaluation of the following:
Moving Beyond the Binary. by James H. Sanders
James H. Sanders, “Moving Beyond the Binary” in Objects and Meaning: New Perspectives on Art and Craft, ed. M. Anna Fariello and Paula Owen, 88-103 (Maryland: Scarecrow Press Inc., 2004)

Reviewed by Randi O’Brien

This is a commendable and persuasive article on fundamental considerations of art history, aesthetics, and criticism within the larger framework of cultural studies and social theory within the visual domain, and specifically craft field. Moving Beyond the Binary written by the Assistant Professor in the Department of Art Education of Ohio State University James H. Sanders, interrogates and offers solutions to traditional hierarchal distribution of aesthetic. The author presents a line of argument for historian, critics, educators, makers, and viewers to redevelop a critical valuation process that strips away the continuation of gendered, racial, and queer labeling to embrace the importance of “theories of craft that dignify the multiple experiences of the maker”. Which the author believes is essential for aesthetic perception in craft aesthetic theory. Sanders is quick to call attention to the separation of the intention of a maker and the interpretation of the viewer sighting situations in gender, race, and sexuality where the maker avoids a sense of identity to fit in to the more acceptable hetronormative hierarchies. Sanders further address that this dismissal of identity reaffirms old standards in aesthetic hierarchies and regress the potential of craft theory to male-dominate, white, homophobic labeling. My overall impression is that the author has developed the rational in a persuasive, controversial, and praiseworthy way while offering both critical questions of the field and resolutions to problems addressed.

In this article, the author has relied on surveys of active studio artist, statistics, and prior aesthetic theory in both the craft and art fields. Historians, critics, educators, makers, and viewers would find this article useful for potential direction in new aesthetic theory as well as suggestions of developing a stronger critical base when evaluating art. Though lacking a humble perspective the article provides specific critical questioning, specific examples, and specific resolution that are refreshing and exciting to read.

In summary, I believe that the author’s position that “more than craft’s simple inclusion within the range of objects considered as art, seeking instead a valuing of craft and art studio practice as models for policy analysis, research, and pedagogical performance. These include explorations of craft as metaphor, as theoretical process, and as a foundation for libratory curriculum. In short”, “an aesthetic theory of craft that challenges the raced, gendered classed, and the hetronormative notions that have imbued fine art with surplus economic and cultural capital and denigrated craft’s functional and social embodied meanings”, has been engagingly defended.