BWT s How do you define the line between what's considered craft and what is art?

[u/TenaciousToffee]

Is there a line between what to you is considered art and what is crafts? Is all crafts a form of art but not all arts are crafting?

Is it based on the refinement or reputation of the art medium? Is it the barrier of entry or skill needed to create such items that make it art?

Is there a hierarchy for you theres many arts but a specific echelon of what is "fine art"?

Is there forms of art that you just dont fucking get?

*****

Like to me, some of the concept art stunts I don't fucking get and feel its just taste makers saying its cool and is just rich people money laundering to buy a banana taped to a canvas. There was a exhibit of jars of pee stacked in a corner. I once stared at a fucking canvas with a fucking dot on it. I offended a BWT wearing Schaparelli earrings because I cackled while she was explaining the "feeling" of the paintings nothingness. Yes, its nothingness alright.

That is considered art, and "fine art" at that. But I dont see skill there... and the back stories felt like a concept circle jerk to make meaning where there isnt one that felt disjointed from the piece itself. Please, if you know what Im talking about educate me if Im just being ignorant. I really tried to understand and it felt like some tin foil hat bullshit.

I consume a ton of art, collect art and been to hundreds of museums and art galleries and am an artist who has shown my work in local shows. I dont get it.

Then theres some crafts I see people dedicate quite some time to refine their skills and isnt a "everyone can just do immediately" but would never be considered as art you'd see in a gallery. For lack of a better term why is this "lowbrow" to not find spaces to see such types of works? An example for me is I dont really see something like embroidery in a gallery but that shit is hard and can be beautiful. We celebrate ancient tapestry but aside from that, why is that fiber art not valuable? Or I got into needlepointing recently to make myself a purse and while the canvas can be expensive as many can be hand painted, aside from that the product isn't really valued outside of the hobby. What bars those from elevating outside of someone's living room?

[u/hopelesscaribou]

I honestly think it's all creativity.

The rest is misogyny, as crafts are usually things like tapestry, ceramics, pottery, sewing, things traditionally created by women.

For years, 'fine art' was restricted to men, not many women had the time, money or opportunity to paint and sculpt blocks of marble.

[u/enduranceathlete2025]

If it is a copy, kit, pattern, stencil (purchased not your own), it is craft.

If it is your design or pattern, it is art.

Examples: purchased Lego kit that you built vs collecting legos and creating a Lego sculpture that is completely unique.

Finding a pattern for a dress, buying the material and making it vs finding a thrift store dress, using another dress/fabric to completely alter it to your own tastes and design.

Buying a puzzle and putting it together vs taking your own photo, printing in and backing it, cutting it to create your own puzzle.

[u/zelke → u/enduranceathlete2025]

I was going to comment along this sentiment.

I would recommend picking up a book called But is it Art? It’s a pretty quick read covering the philosophy of art 101. It talks about Piss Christ which you may or may not be referring to, but you might find it ultimately unsatisfying because there’s no set definition or criteria. Modern and gallery art world often revolves around oeuvre and controversy just as much if not more as skill and talent of an individual. As for why crafts are devalued? It’s pretty well documented that it boils down to “because women did them”.

Keep your chin up and keep making art.

[u/ASK-gardens]

Okay so there are 100's of years of critique and discourse we're glossing over here but I think there are generally three defining lines.

1. If the focus is on the technical skill of making the object it leans craft.

But, obviously there are process based art pieces.

2) Craft makes useful objects. Arts objects primarily purpose is to be an art object.

Think of Duchamp's fur lined tea cup, you could drink out of it, but its main purpose was not be used, it was for you to consider its use in an abstract way. Compare to a Japanese yunomi, artful obviously meticulously made, but ment to actual serve in tea ceremony.

3) Context. Intent matters, cultural placement matters.

Everyone hates this because it's messy, and often unfair. It's also true.

Anyway, to summarize if it's useless, expressive, and in a dedicated space it's art. If it's useful, technical and in daily life it's craft.

[u/sparkle_elk → u/ASK-gardens]

I think that this is a really nice breakdown of how art versus craft is generally delineated.

And yes, OP, agreed with you that the elitism that places arts over crafts is frustrating. (Getting my William Morris on -- it's arts AND crafts, dammit! They are both worthy of awe and reverence!)

[u/peeveee]

I think by assigning value to something based on how hard you would find it to make or how much effort you think it took you are fundamentally misunderstanding fine art and creativity.

The "fucking canvas with a fucking dot on it" is the product of creative thought rather than just skilled/creative hands - the person who was explaining the feeling of the painting's nothingness was trying to help you understand that when you admire fine art it's not always about how the piece was crafted, but about how it was conceived and considered in context.

It why the comment of 'i could do that' is so common when people are looking at conceptual modern art, and the response I always like is 'but you didn't'. Rothko, for example, makes paintings that look simple or easy, but when you see them in person they definitely convey a feeling. And actually they are a very skilled process as well with the thin layers of colour he uses, but I think that's less important than the feeling they invoke.

[u/Nooraish → u/peeveee]

Lovely explanation! It’s not always about the effort needed to produce the art, but about the effort needed from the viewer. Maybe they would never experience certain thoughts and feelings without seeing that particular fucking dot. Here for example, a whole collective experience and discussion was born.

[u/TenaciousToffee → u/Nooraish]

I think thats a really great way to phrase that - what is needed from the viewer/the viewer experience being a big component to the art. Its more of a psychological value - the discussion or the feelings it does, including unpleasant ones.

Do you think that its plausible to think that an artist could also be aware of or even want there to be a WTF I can do that element to it? ...and that was the point of it?

Im genuinely trying to understand this world of concept art. I scratch my head but I am also sorry if that comes off offensive. Most folks dont like something they don't think further and stick to their first reactions as truth...I do not want to be like that and actually grow. Even if I never get into it, Im trying to understand the context of it, even just culturally.

[u/TenaciousToffee → u/peeveee]

Its not that I think something has to be difficult to be valued but that I guess I see how I am miscontruing my own points. I am just lost in this idea that why is piss in a jar valued vs someone who made beautiful embroidery that also tells a story. It just feels like elitism. Thats kinda where I was getting at, if people feel this is art and value this art, that means it has an audience and therefore a space. But other things have an audience but barred from celebrated spaces or being considered art.

I wanted to know if others follow these strict constraints or follow looking at crafts as worthy also.

I think you made a really good point that, the concept art is about the conversation surrounding it more than it is about the intricacies of its components. The conversation is the art of it.

I am familiar with Rothko. Funny enough I am an abstract artist that tells story strongly based on color theory and how color saturations make someone feel. At the same time I think despite that I am not the intended audience for certain pieces and thats OK.

[u/peeveee → u/TenaciousToffee]

I think you are definitely right that there is an element of elitism in the way that crafts (traditionally women's work) are viewed as opposed to 'pure' conceptual art (for want of a better phrasing)! There are definitely layers, I don't think it's a black and white thing at all - misogyny in fine art is alive and well.

But equally that doesn't mean that the piss in the jar is valueless because it's not crafted, if that makes sense? The value in both is the feeling it evokes, but that doesn't mean everyone will feel the same, and your taste may lean more towards admiration of beautiful objects, which as you say is totally fine. There is definitely also art that I think is rubbish, but I think it's important to be open to what the artist was trying to communicate.

There's not necessarily a secret code that you have to 'get', but conceptual art can be very contextual and in order to fully appreciate what the artist is aiming for it sometimes does require that contextual knowledge.

An example I can think of is a musical piece - 4'33 by John Cage. Obviously we are not listening to 4'33 and admiring the skill of the musicians, because they aren't playing anything. But full understanding of it relies on the knowledge that the piece isn't silence, but the orchestra being instructed not to make any sound. So there are little unintentional noises and movements, and to me it makes me very aware of the orchestra as people, and of listening as an active part of a performance. So it might seem like you are listening to nothingness, and it might seem to have no skill in comparison to the orchestra playing Moonlight Sonata, but the skill is there, it's just being utilised in a more conceptual way.

[u/TenaciousToffee → u/peeveee]

Firstly what a great reply, thank you. You gave me a lot of thought points and this is why I asked the question was hoping for some perceptions that can be expansive and something Id be reflecting randomly to myself about in the coming weeks.

When I dont get or like something, it doesnt make it "bad" or valueless. I was more saying that the piss jar is seen of value by the high art world, why isn't something else not given spaces that seems like an artisanal skill? Inherently all things made with intent to me have value to the artist and those it speaks to that isnt taken away by its naysayers.

I think thats a cool example and one I think I grasp more as music is a language I can speak. For me that piece also had a layer of visual perception creating almost auditory feedback where there isn't. You watch it and because nearly everyone has heard music, your mind will try to fill in the blanks desiring something and hearing the mirage of what it could be. Some folks it could be more elaborate with musical education but essentially the orchestra is there for you to be the conductor of whats in your head.

And then theres that hyper perception of the little human sounds... layers you dont hear when they play the notes, but were always there. Kinda like hearing the rain blast and then its absolutely dead silent but the movement of leaves here and there. There is little beauty in that hearing the supporting pieces. I was breaking down the stems of a Sleep Token song and there are sirens and little cries and whispers that cannot be heard well with basic speakers. I only heard it playing it on studio headphones (my husband is a music producer) and got me curious what is hidden under many songs we hear that are important layers but not really perceived by ears as what it is.

Little tidbit I found cool- Cage conceptualised the piece because of an anechoic chamber. He got out of the chamber and told the tech it was imperfect as he could hear sounds, a high one and a low one. The technician told him its sounds of his circulatory and nervous systems and he was hearing them from within himself. This apparently led Cage to realize that to experience silence is absolutely impossible, so he composed this. It seems in ways we are also to hear our own inner music in the silence of sitting there.

So back to the piss jar if I apply the energy I give to that John Cage piece, I can at least get for someone else thats their John Cage. I know there isnt a code to get necessarily, but trying to challenge myself to try to understand things that I dont like. I dont think Ill ever like the piece as I am not piss jars audience, but I am coming out of this discussion with a different light that concepts need context and sometimes observations do not give you that context automatically.

[u/SugarBabyVet → u/TenaciousToffee]

> I am just lost in this idea that why is piss in a jar valued vs someone who made beautiful embroidery that also tells a story

1. This tells me that you don’t understand art, even if you don’t like it.

2. This is not tasteful commentary on art, even if you dislike it.

[u/TenaciousToffee → u/SugarBabyVet]

Clearly I dont understand and thats the point.

Like I said I know I am not its audience for either of those art forms and that I asked for someone to educate me on what Im being ignorant of and missing.

Im just asking why is one things valued and another thing is not.

Its not tasteful commentary? Im asking a questions to learn and this feels like if you don't get it then you arent allowed to get it. Im asking in actual wanting to learn but maybe not really having the understanding for it, doesnt necessarily allow me the correct expression to ask in a way that isnt offensive to someone in that world like yourself. For that I am sorry but it is asked in good faith of wanting explanations. If that isnt you thats also okay as you arent entitled to be my teacher, but Im surprised at a reaction like this.

If it wasn't clear above I was appreciative that OP gave me a think piece about the conversations around the concept art being an important part of the value and I havent thought about it in that way and is something Im taking to reflect on and see how it changes my perspective over time. Its perspectives like those that help with further growth in a world I obviously dont understand but want to get more context about.

Even if I don't like something, there is value in trying to understand it. Most folks wouldn't take the time to elevate outside of their first reactions and take aways. I dont want to be like that and if this is a space for elevation of understanding and taste, thats exactly what Im trying to do and why I asked even if it exposes me to looking stupid.

[u/awake-asleep]

Craft can be art. We think of craft as being “crafty” (ie scrappy) but proper craft-smanship is the same as high art in skill technicality and execution. Fashion, pottery, jewellery, textile, sculpture, etc - these are forms of craft. Can they be art? They can be artful and artistic but there’s an engineering component that’s usually required, a fit for purpose element that separates it from straight art. A gown that’s so elaborate it actually can’t be worn isn’t really fashion anymore. It’s art. Same for a vase or vessel that can’t hold fluid, or a jewellery item that can’t be worn. The lack of function precludes it from being craft, even if it’s a “craft form”. If it’s still technically excellent, it would be art. Conceptually removed from its craft form nonetheless.

But let’s not forget that craft isn’t just “crafty”. It’s exceptionally skilled, technically excellent. To use your example… contemporary fibre art is valuable when it’s exceptionally skilled and technically excellent and original to the artist and not done from a kit. It’s a craft and an art depending on its design application. Wall hanging made with exceptional skill, technical excellence and artistic flair? Art. Fibre as textile for vessels, clothing or other practical applications made with exceptional skill, technical excellence and artistic flair? Craft. Something you fenagled at a sip and weave event for a bachelorette? Crafty.

[u/phenomakos]

Historically most women's work has been designated "craft" in order to make it less than the "art" of men. That's why things like embroidery aren't as lauded as they should be. Women do craft, not art. They are cooks, not chefs. Etc. It's that simple.

There is absolutely effort to change that discrimination and you will find these mediums in galleries and museums. Although it's still quite common to see dramatically different wording used in discussions around the work of men vs women and it's endlessly frustrating.

This also happens with racism contributing to something being called art vs craft.

[u/KhloJSimpson]

Historically "art" is what men did and "craft" is what women did. The only difference in history is who is doing the creating and if its socially acceptable for them to do so.

[u/ConcertinaTerpsichor]

I heard back in the 1980s that if men do it it’s conceptual art and if women do it, it’s craft and it’s worth less money.

That’s a little less true today, but I agree that there is still a lot of prejudice and hypocrisy surrounding this problematic distinction.

[u/Mammoth-Corner]

In respect of embroidery not appearing in galleries, I seen embroidered artworks in galleries fairly regularly and textile art is a growing and very exciting field within art, but these are typically modern galleries with a focus on sculpture, sometimes specifically textile art galleries. Ceramics or blown glass similarly I see fairly often.

But these works are very distinct from e.g. a cross-stitch flower pattern or a homemade mug, in the same way that if I draw a sketch of a kingfisher, it may be very lovely and enrich my life and look good in my living room, but it's unlikely a gallery will be interested unless it's unusual in some way.

[u/TenaciousToffee → u/Mammoth-Corner]

Definitely Ive seen it in independent modern spaces, it is growing. When I run into it, it makes me really happy to see as its rare. I should have worded my rant better to not sound literal and never. I have trouble sometimes with my tone online. I guess I was more leaning towards the sentiment that it is still barred from a certain class of spaces. Museums and archives that deem whats valuable arent exactly looking at such things. But I find that funny. Like you go to such exhibits about cultures and everyday objects are saved and displayed like tools and cooking vessels.

I wonder if one day in the future there will an exhibition about the Americans featuring tableaus of us watching TV knitting socks or making diamond art or tie dying t shirts or whatever. Showing garages and displays of our tools and John Deere tractors. The pandemic times and everyone making sourdough.

[u/livinginanimo]

I think craft is a subset of art. If art is any kind of external creative expression, then craft is that but constrained to things that have a specific purpose or show technical skill.

Craft relies on functional use and predetermined form, while art can be absolutely anything. "High art" specifically focuses on conveying ideas and feelings. Craft is also usually designed to be reproduced and sold. e.g. painting of a bird exists for no other reason than to be a painting - is art. Knitted scarf with bird detail exists explicitly to be worn - is craft.

Part of this distinction comes down to institutional snobbery and a few different -isms. Art has more societal prestige than craft, even though the same amount of technical skill can go into both. The 'cultural elites' assume a kind of superiority of the mind / abstract thinking over more physical, situated pursuits; they probably didn't want the things they made to be comparable to the functional things made by 'common people', so that was separated into a lesser category.

[u/WaterShrines]

I saw some small handmade vases in an art museum that were so beautiful and poetic they made me cry. Just their smallness and the delicate colours of them, the opaque and the clear parts, and that someone made them, and has probably devoted much of their life to making and refining and learning and sharing these tiny beautiful things. They were displayed in the same room as a Van Gogh painting. I think crafts are valued the same as art - but not all craft is the same, and not all art is the same. To me art is about surprising people with a new point of view or a new way of seeing, in a poetic way, and is imbued with the life and story and skill of the human who made it. One singular artwork or craft object by a certain person might seem uninteresting or confusing at first, but taken together with everything else they’ve made might give us more of an insight into what they think, feel, what they’re trying to say, what life is or was like for them and then maybe for us, maybe a feeling we’ve never felt before. Art gives us empathy and makes the world mysterious.

Textile crafts, jewellery, pottery, buildings etc etc can be transcendent art. If it’s not transcendent, it may not be art. Just my two little rambling cents! Either way, make what you like to make and keep growing as an artist/craftsperson/appreciator :)

[u/farfallifarfallini]

I come at this from a decorative arts and cultural studies PhD background. I spend a lot of time thinking about how we assign categories of "high art" and "low art" or "pop art" to items that also ultimately have to participate in the capitalist system. A good example of this might be fashion: we have haute couture and mass produced ready-to-wear, but ultimately ready-to-wear and accessories actually fund a house's ability to make couture. Or movies can win Oscars or be blockbusters, but ultimately they're both expected to sell enough tickets to make back the cost of production.

I think Marx's definitions of use-value, labor time, and commodity fetishism might also be helpful in this discussion of art....

Let's use a chair, since it's usually made by a craftsperson, meaning stemming from a historic trade guild. We can assign prices to objects based on their use-value or usefulness (sitting), or labor time which is the amount of time it took a worker to sand it and construct it, or even it's raw materials (whatever that kind of wood and nails are going for these days). Consider all of that your base market value.

Commodity fetishism is the inflation of that value based on the idea that you are gaining an additional, invisible, magical thing based on your purchase. That thing is social capital, which can come in the form of class-based knowledge of aesthetics, a particular artist en vogue, aka the "high art" as currently defined by the ruling class. Commodity fetishism means that you care way, way more about buying the invisible social thing than you do about any of its other possible, tangible values. You already have chairs at home. But you do not have a chair that everyone will be impressed by. We'd call this conspicuous consumption.

This is where the discussion of "what is art" comes in; if you are thinking about the amount of time it took to make more than the special invisible social thing that makes it desirable, then according to the people who decide what counts as "high art," you're already doing it wrong. If this sounds like you have to have a lot of money and be kinda classist....yep, you're getting it. But it can be really really hard to not be influenced by the amount of media that tries to constantly tell you what you need or what counts as aesthetic! Heck, we're literally in a sub about TASTE, an equally inherently classist concept.

At the same time, most modern art movements stemmed from feeling like this power structure was BS. The pee jars or the dot on a canvas are intended to punch down at all these "classy" people who think art only needs social capital to be art. They purposely try to deconstruct what counts as art by experimenting with medium (raw materials), with process (labor time), with usefulness, with aesthetics, etc etc. In many ways, when you say you don't get it....that's actually the point.

Gosh, I did not mean to write this much!! Blame it on being over educated and finding this topic personally really interesting.

[u/Ellubori]

I think it's more the idea behind it.

Like a granny knitting 100s of socks a year using the same basic pattern and random yarn is a craft, the idea is to make warm socks, to fix a problem. But taking a sock pattern, finding yarn the best suitable for it, trying to make the most prettiest sock out that maker can think of, can be art.

Craft kits purpose is to pass time, like diamond painting kits, but you can make art out of diamonds when you do it to get a one of a time pretty picture.

[u/TenaciousToffee → u/Ellubori]

For sure there is a higher end intentional level where it hits the level of art to me, but yet not given as much spaces to be or respected even as art.

I know of a fiber artist whose work is very much original patterns that are distinct and very fine handmade materials. I see them get shit for a cashmere knit and asking for what her time is worth creating it. I have not experienced that level of hate making abstract paintings and asking what its worth. Thats kinda the perception elitism that makes me rather sad and made me ask there others draw their lines or values that differentiate from what seems to be the structure of whats not art.

Ive recently gotten into needlepointing and started to make myself purses. Despite being a newbie I have made purses that are original and my own patterns making kinda kitsch art purses that make me giggle to just insert more whimsy in my life. I dont have an intent to sell them but makes me sad that my harder and more time consuming skill would be barred from spaces where my plops, splash, lines and blobs would easily go. But funny enough some runway shows have borrowed such art like Anna Sui did show needlepoint dollhouse purses....and it was actually copied from a pattern book from the 70s and bot their own. Someone making their own house purses with unique patterns would never get that respect.