Joanie

Will, I'm sorry if the word "craft" brings little woven potholders to mind for you. It doesn't for me. So that's the difference.

To me, and others like me (Ron I suspect) craft means being able to do something well. Yes, the guilds you mentioned are gone. But their legacy lives on. People who work in stone, in wood, in pottery, in straw and bone and ivory still make quality work.

Vance, I disagree with you too, regretfully. Utility is not the defining character, for me. A wonderful inlaid floor is utilitarian, and can be as full of art as a painted ceiling done by a master craftsman. The utility can actually augment the art in a good piece. If you say that utility alone is what makes something craft rather than art, then all of the Etruscan urns that hold the ashes of the dead, all of the beautiful tiny scales that the Pompeiian people used to measure their spices, all of the handmade one of a kind teapots made by the potters of Japan are just craft. In fact, using that reasoning, the bonsai pots themselves are craft, because they serve a purpose. King Tut's outer mummy case, with its inlaid gold and gems, is only craft because it held his body.

Silly little knitted booties made by Grandma don't hold a candle to the "textile art" that is available now, incredible work by incredibly gifted artists. Do the silly little knitted booties, simply by existing, nullify the art of the textile artists, who choose to work in wool and cotton and straw and beads? Are dumb little cheesy painted signs that say "Mom is the Best" enough to render the portraiture of the Roman Egyptians into the craft category, which is also just paint on wood? Is the little Paleolithic bone scraper with a horse carved on it "only craft", because they make cheap knives now in Pakistan? There are a thousand more examples, just open your eyes to the world. Art is everywhere, in every corner, when people are given the chance to enrich their environment.

All I'm saying is that art is what catches your breath, art is what transcends. You can't declare it, you can't draw the line, you can't know what posterity will consider worthwhile. You can only do something to the best of your ability, and strive to do better every time. Artist or craftsman, call your work what you will, it is your peers that will judge you and posterity that will either ignore you or hold you in high acclaim.

Joanie