SHOPCLAS AS SOULCRAFT

Shop class as

Soulcraft

Currently, we live in a knowledge economy in which most of the work we perform is abstract and fragmented. Information and knowledge have become core values and manual labor is often seen as lesser than intellectual labor. Even as an architecture student, a study that is concerned with the material world, I spend most of my time focusing on abstract concepts.

‘Why is craftsmanship still relevant?’, we might wonder while tinkering away at our larger than life computer renderings. Currently, we spend about 6,5 hours a day within the virtual world, be it for school, work, leisure or communication. However, as we are not yet able to upload ourselves to the cloud, we’re very much still inhabitants of the material world. But in contrast to the craftsman, who is a conscious part of this world through manual labor, we are slowly losing our grasp on it.

Let me try to answer the above question through James Gibson’s concept of affordances. Gibson argues that we experience the objects of our environment not as neutral entities, which we simply name and categorize but that they carry inherent possibilities, called affordances.1 This means that our perception of the environment is not merely through input from the external senses. It is rather a system of action-oriented perception; meaning we map our environment in terms of action or potential actions. The ability to anticipate these actions comes from previous bodily experience in the form of the acquisition or expansion of our sensorimotor skills, or in simpler words: mastering a movement or tool.

This can be illustrated by comparing our dynamic field, the collection of potential actions regarding movement, to that of a free climber: mountain climbers who may only use equipment for protection against falling and not to assist progress. The dynamic field of a regular person is more limited than that of a free climber. When confronted with a hallway, we sense the potential action of moving forward. Similarly, when confronted with stairs, we perceive it as a possible route upwards. However, when confronted with a solid rock, we will perceive it as a blockage and our premotor cortex will not fire in preparation of ascension. In contrast, a free climber, through his motor skills and previous experience, will sense a route and therefore his field of potential action is wider than ours. This comparison can also be applied to the modern human and the craftsman. The craftsman, through their motor skills and previous experience, has a larger field of potential manual action than the average modern person. Their cognition of tools and material - or in more general terms; the physical world - thus carries more information. The effects of our learned helplessness, a lack of manual and technical knowledge, goes further than not being able to fix our own sink when it’s leaking; we also understand it less as an entity. When expanding the example of the sink to the entire physical world, it portrays an environment, which is confusing if not hostile. The loss of connection to the material world could spark one of two reactions; either we retract even more into seemingly virtual perfection, or we literally try to tackle it hands-on.

Interested in the empowering effect of working with one’s hands, I went into conversation with three workshops that have craftsmanship as a main core value: the Openbare Werkplaats Amsterdam, the Stadswerkplaats Utrecht, and the ‘klusclub’ of a group of students from TU Delft. Each conversation hacked away at an upbringing that had always focused on getting me into higher ‘knowledge’ education.

Empowerment formed the main motive for the Stadswerkplaats Utrecht to come about. Stadswerkplaats Utrecht originated in a neighbourhood where a lot of renovations were taking place. The architects involved felt like the inhabitants should be able to make their own adaptations and started an open workshop. The municipality supported the initiative by paying the workshop’s rent. A volunteer recalls: “I think, the municipality thought they wanted to stimulate that people learned to build things and make things themselves”. Fast-forward 35 years: the workshop is still going strong and largely run by volunteers.

However, craftsmanship entails more than manual competence. In contrast to the online world, it requires concentration and patience. The virtual world is a playground of autonomy, choice and freedom, but with its quick visual changes, it is one of distraction rather than contemplation. Philosopher Albert Borgmann argues that some things have a life and dignity of their own, e.g. works of art, music, and sacred places. He

calls “skilled and active human engagement” with such things focal practices.2 The strength of the virtual world lies in the suggestion that the pleasure of things and practices can be removed from their context and made available though a technical device. However, such readily availability of a thing destroys its commanding presence.

The need for concentration is also mentioned in a recent interview I conducted at the Openbare Werkplaats Amsterdam. One of the local craftsmen recounts the relief and focus participants of their workshops experience: “The tempo is very high everywhere and with craftsmanship that isn’t possible. [...] You have to take back a couple of gears, because this work requires concentration, peace of mind and a steady pace.” In addition, participants often express their surprise that they feel exhausted at the end of a three-hour workshop. The popularity of these courses in public workshops throughout the Netherlands shows the need for focal practices that require an engaging mix of work and pleasure.

This need is also present in a generation that grew up with the virtual world as becomes clear in a conversation with Louise Houweling, an industrial design student at TU Delft. Together with ten fellow students she started a ‘klusclub’ at the Schiehallen in Delft. The idea started from a mutual desire to work more with one’s hands. Houweling ponders: “It has to be that there’s a large demand for something like this in Delft, because people are creative and want to make and build things.”

I’m guessing she’s right. The sports and culture centre X of TU Delft organizes 10 crafts courses like pottery and screen-printing. Notoriously, most of these classes are booked full within the first five minutes of opening. It seems like we, as future engineers, long for working with our hands. Makers Space Delft, anyone? //

SOURCES

1 Mallgrave, H.F. (2018). From Object to Experience. The New Culture of Architectural Design. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. 2 Crawford, M.B. (2009). Shop Class as Soulcraft. An inquiry into the value of work. The Penguin Press.