Join us for a conversation between makers, teachers, historians, students, and curators exploring some of the pivotal people who have impacted craft—understood expansively and inclusively—in the US over the last century. Almost everyone can name a teacher who offered transformative access to a creative life. How do certain teachers shape the ways we make and understand the worlds around us? Who are the big names, the unsung heroes, and those marginalized by strict disciplinary boundaries? And who have they taught? In a wide-ranging discussion seeking to answer these questions as they relate to craft, participants reflect on intersecting identities, matrilineal inheritances, and engaging with one’s ancestors as a way to form new craft knowledge.

This is the first of three events for “Craft Schools,” a multiyear project encompassing public programs, artwork acquisitions to enhance the MFA’s contemporary craft collection, travel to meet artists across all 48 contiguous United States, and, ultimately, a publication framing modern-day craft as expansive, inclusive, and alive—inside and outside the walls of museums.

Adebunmi Gbadebo, artist
Beth Lo, artist
In conversation with Warren Wilson College MA in Critical Craft Class of 2022: Kat Gordon, Laurin Guthrie, Lexie Harvey, Kate Hawes, Maru Lopez, and Kae Lorentz
Moderated by Michelle Millar Fisher, Ronald C. and Anita L. Wornick Curator of Contemporary Decorative Arts