Transferring skill over 2000 years: A study of two disciplines

Abstract

This paper will look at the practical, technical and creative potential when a traditional craftsperson who works with his hands and sketchbooks is given the opportunity to work full time in digital design, working with CAD CAM and 3D printing machines.

I have worked as a glassmaker and designer for 25 years, working from sketches and then developing my designs 'on the end of the iron' in a hot glass workshop. The process I have used has remained virtually unchanged for 2000 years. As a successful designer, I have had over 70 products go into production, many of them are still being produced today. I have worked for prestigious companies such as Habitat, Selfridges, Dartington Crystal and TVG and am currently on the design team at Caithness Glass. I never used digital technology and only used a PC as a word processor. Indeed, I was very much against the use of CAD, believing that although fine for product design, it could be detrimental to creative development within contemporary craft.

Last year I was given a new role within Plymouth College of Art within resource development. A major part of my work is to facilitate the use of our 3D printer, and help to plan our new Fab Lab. In order to do this, I have learnt how to use a 3D CAD programme and how to export the data into files that can be used on a 3D printer, milling machine, laser cutter and water jet cutter.

This has been a tremendously exciting time for me, and has completely changed my outlook on the use of digital technology in contemporary craft. I have used my past experience to work out ways of bypassing the limitations of working with a very simple 3D printing machine, achieving results that would be expected from a far more complex and expensive piece of equipment. I will use examples of the work that I have printed from my own designs and that of students from PCA to evidence that very complex outcomes can be created using traditional modes of thinking based on years of practical experience within the workshop. I wish to demonstrate that tacit skill is transferrable into the digital world and is just as relevant when working in front of a computer screen.

After 6 months away from a glass workshop I made a piece that I would like to display using traditional methods. It evidences an improved understanding of scale, proportion and composition and is I believe a financially sustainable product. New technologies could well be the savior of a dying craft.

This paper will explore the reasons for the significant improvement in both of these separate practices, due to the interaction of each on the other. It will cover the acquisition and application of practical and tacit skill and detail the vital importance of tacit understanding which enables the skills to be transferrable.