Folk Art Question - Understanding Its Evolution and Influence

[existenceproduct]

Hello everyone,

I'm curious about the evolution of folk art and its influence on modern art movements.

Folk art, with its deep cultural roots, often carries themes of tradition, everyday life, and personal expression.

However, how has the shift from handcrafted pieces to more mass-produced forms affected the authenticity and impact of folk art?

Is there a line where folk art transitions into something else, or does its essence remain in the craftsmanship and symbolism?

I'd love to hear your thoughts on how folk art has adapted and its relevance in today's world.

 

[existenceproduct]

Hello everyone,

I'm curious about the evolution of folk art and its influence on modern art movements.

Folk art, with its deep cultural roots, often carries themes of tradition, everyday life, and personal expression.

However, how has the shift from handcrafted pieces to more mass-produced forms affected the authenticity and impact of folk art?

Is there a line where folk art transitions into something else, or does its essence remain in the craftsmanship and symbolism in folk art?

I'd love to hear your thoughts on how folk art has adapted and its relevance in today's world.

thanks in advance for any help

 

[Doppler9000]

Conversations about the nature of art are fraught, but some thoughts:

I think of folk “art” as items made for purely or mostly decorative purposes.

Functional things like quilts, I think of as crafts, the fact that they are made to look beautiful or interesting notwithstanding.

The shift to mass production, in much of the world, happened decades ago.

The analysis of symbolism in this sort of realm seems, mostly, a post-facto exercise undertaken by academics. Sometimes a square is just a square.

 

[vieri]

Conversations about the nature of art are fraught, but some thoughts:

I think of folk “art” as items made for purely or mostly decorative purposes.

Functional things like quilts, I think of as crafts, the fact that they are made to look beautiful or interesting notwithstanding.

The shift to mass production, in much of the world, happened decades ago.

The analysis of symbolism in this sort of realm seems, mostly, a post-facto exercise undertaken by academics. Sometimes a square is just a square.

Agreed. I'd add, more in general - meaning, not strictly related to folk art - that nowadays the already fraught conversations about the nature of art are suffering from two things that weren't there much before the advent of social media:

1. The tendency of million of people to self-label themselves as "artist", just because the can take a snapshot and post it on their social media of choice; in the (better) old days, one needed to be validate as artist by others, which took a little more than just a self-declaration.
2. The nature of social media that, removing any kind of curatorship, levelled everything to the minimum denominator: if everything is art, nothing is.

I am all for removing gatekeeping, in the sense of allowing the highest possible number of people access to everything. But, that to me means removing obstacles in, does not mean allowing everyone who got in to come out with a degree. To become a MD and cut people open, I am still in favour of having doctors studying long years and pass exams, rather than proclaiming themselves doctors just because they feel like one. Not the same thing, of course, but to be recognised as an artist I still believe that one needs other people - qualified, possibly - to say so. Of course, I am happy if someone feels they are artists; that's the first and most important motivator to keep going, keep creating. But, one then needs - at some point - that someone else but themselves feels the same about their art, and not someone on Facebook who doesn't know anything and just clicks on "like" hoping for their own posts to get likes in return.

Best regards,

Vieri

 

[Geoff]

There are several threads running through your question, some of which intersect at moments, but also they operate independently. In brief, they might be summarized as queries into:
- folk art vs. high art
- the role of industrialism on art
- issues of craftsmanship on art and artistic production

If one looks (for example) at the period of the 1920s-30s, there was a lot of discussion about the last two issues - this was the founding question behind the Bauhaus, if there was room for art in an industrial society.

On the other hand, the relationship between folk art and "high art" is a question that varies (to some extent) depending on when one looks at it. There are periods when art movements look very closely at folk art, or even indigenous or outsider art, and then there are times they are far apart. And within the "art" world, there is high and low art (popular) - which can be the subject of heated discussions and much non-agreement.

There have been periods when art movements look to primitive art - such as African or Cycladic art - as inspiration. Josef and Anne Albers were deeply interested in Mexican indigenous art, and in her book "On Weaving" learns a great deal on weaving craftsmanship from central and South America.

Another thing to consider is when outsider or folk art somehow takes a life of its own. The famous weavers (corrected: quilters) of Gees Bend in Alabama did fantastic work that is close to the abstract art of the time, but remained local and special.

Hope this helps,
Geoff

 

[Doppler9000]

The famous weavers of Gees Bend in Alabama did fantastic work that is close to the abstract art of the time, but remained local and special.

Hope this helps,
Geoff

Just wanted to point out that the textiles from Gee’s Bend are quilts, not weavings.

Many of them are remarkable, and transcend craft in my view.

 

[sbjornda]

I'll bet if you went to your local university and bought lunch for a grad student in Art History, you'd learn more about it than you ever wanted to know.

Best wishes,
Sterling

 

[Pieter 12]

Don't forget the category of Outsider Art, generally artists without any formal art training or education.