Introducing Crafted and #CraftingHeritageMonth
Over the past year a wide variety of stories about traditional crafts, the history of different types of artisanship throughout Europe, and interviews with contemporary craftspeople have been appearing on the Europeana website, collected together on the Making Culture feature page.
If you would like contribute to these highlights of craft heritage as a cultural heritage institution with collections around fashion and textiles, analogue media or traditional crafts, you can get involved with #CraftingHeritage Month on social media this November!
To take part, share your inspiring collections with Europeana and the entire community on social media by adding #CraftingHeritage to your post. Is your collection or story just too elaborate and detailed for social media? Reach out to [email protected] and let’s discuss how we can showcase your collection in a blog, gallery and/or video!
#CraftingHeritage Month is inspired by the CRAFTED Enrich and promote traditional and contemporary crafts project, which aims to support the transfer of European crafts to future generations by aggregating, enriching and promoting crafts heritage. The project partners have created (and continue to create) blogs, galleries, videos, and exhibitions that offer a unique resource to better understand, preserve and reuse the rich tangible and intangible heritage of European crafts. Looking for inspiration on how to contribute during #CraftingHeritage Month? Take a look at some of the project’s most exciting creations.
Blogs with new perspectives
The project has published a number of blogs highlighting new perspectives on the histories of crafts and textiles. The field of textile arts is predominantly led by female artisans who use this intricate work to explore their femininity and actively take part in creative and social discourse. For example, the ‘Antonia Suardi Collection’ includes over 1,500 pieces of embroidery and lace from the personal collection of the Italian Countess Antonia Ponti Suardi (1860-1938). How the collection, conserved in the Museo del Tessuto di Prato, contributed to encouraging a new perspective of social emancipation for women can be read in the blog Women crafting freedom.
Interviews with artists
Interviews have been another editorial format used to explore crafts heritage, for example, with Brankica Zilovic, who incorporates the world of textiles in her contemporary art installations, pictorial configurations and drawings. In her creations, Brankica blurs the traditional boundaries established between crafts and contemporary art and carries a message of resilience. 'In the 1980s and 1990s, you could see that textiles could take on an important role in critical space … [female artists] animated and mobilised questions about gender, the values of our society, individuals, political issues, female emancipation, etc.' explains Brankica in an interview for the CRAFTED project.
A mini video series
The project has made a mini series through the CRAFTED YouTube playlist, with episodes focusing on radio, one of the first forms of media to be used as a worldwide communication network for the masses. Radio was not only bringing news told by human voices to homes, crossing cities and borders. It also brought people together, either as listeners or as builders and modifiers of radios themselves. Today, despite TV and the internet, radio remains ever-present in daily life. Rob, Dennis and Martin, volunteers at Netherlands Institute for Sound & Vision and passionate radio-makers, told the CRAFTED project all about the craft and art of radio during its analogue years in a mini video series.
You can expect many more exciting videos to come with topics ranging from the technique of analogue animation to beautiful ceramic pottery.
Varied exhibitions
When it comes to inspiration, nature is an incredible source for fashion. For centuries, makers and designers have been fascinated with the natural world, considering its richness a starting point for a new creative language, with its own motifs, forms and colours. You can take a deep dive into the relationship between fashion, nature and craft in the online exhibition Nature crafting fashion, which the CRAFTED project has developed.
At the end of this year’s #CraftingHeritage Month a second exhibition will be published. '100 years of amateur film' will cover the craft from 1922 to 2022 and will highlight the first successful home cinema format and technology, the Pathé-Baby 9.5mm film projector, among other innovative techniques.
It’s your turn during #CraftingHeritage Month
Whether you are a cultural heritage professional or crafting enthusiast, there are a number of ways to get involved in #CraftingHeritageMonth:
As a cultural heritage institution, share inspiring collections with Europeana and a wider community on social media with the #CraftingHeritage hashtag.
Reach out to [email protected] to discuss how we can showcase your collection in a blog, gallery and/or video on Europeana.
Keep an eye on the #CraftingHeritage hashtag on social media in November. There will be plenty of ways to share your artisan heritage by sharing pictures, videos and anecdotes about the crafts you are passionate about. Not very crafty yourself? Stories from your artisan family members and friends, or even your local city or country, are just as exciting!
Are you up to the GIF-making challenge? Be sure to start creating your GIF this October! Europeana has gathered some of the best #CraftingHeritage images and videos that you can use freely in your GIF for Europeana’s GIF IT UP campaign. During #CraftingHeritage Month the winners will be announced!