Interact: Contemporary Craft in a Digital Future

The Craft Australia online forum Interact: Contemporary Craft in a Digital Future is an opportunity for national dialogue on the issues that are driving changes in the Australian craft sector. Interact will be delivered online through the Craft Australia website.

www.craftaustralia.com.au/nationalForum/2004/

To be a maker in Australia is a challenging brief, the roads leading to success in this career are many and varied. To address the breadth of approaches to contemporary craft practice in this country, Interact presents articles covering a range of topics that are the current hot spots for the sector. These topics include:

• What’s in a name, the role of language in shaping practice?
• A match made in heaven, contemporary craft and digital technologies, how long will it last?
• Use it or lose it. Is craft training at tertiary institutions in danger?

Leading artists and theoreticians have been commissioned by Craft Australia to write articles on these topics. The articles are controversial in the contrasting opinions they put forward and collectively represent an overview of the issues facing contemporary craft practice in Australia. These articles are the doorways into the Forum discussion. You will find them on the Craft Australia website in the Interact Forum where you can join the discussion lists and add your ideas and responses to the conversations. Craft Australia presents the Interact Forum as a venue for healthy debate and an opportunity to define future directions in contemporary craft across the sector from policy, strategic planning to applied arts education. With this information Craft Australia is strategically informed to achieve its key objectives of advocacy and lobbying for the sector.

Interact: Contemporary Craft in a Digital Future is a national collaboration between Craft Australia the State and Territory craft organisations and professional practitioners. Through the Craft Organisations of Australia, a network of peak organisations in each State and Territory of Australia, Interact will be introduced via a ‘real’ launch that will explain how to get ‘virtual’ with the Forum. It is the first time the sector has combined online to gauge the position of contemporary craft at national level. More details about launch venues are available on the Craft Australia website: www.craftaustralia.com.au.

For makers Interact will mean an opportunity to communicate views on the developments of craft in Australia as it applies to practice and to be part of a process that will shape and determine future opportunities. For educators, promoters and custodians of contemporary craft this is an opportunity to discuss the infrastructure of support for the sector and to propose the desired futures that will advance the field in Australia.

Communication is information and information is the key to sustainable futures. Interact: Contemporary Craft in a Digital Future is an open dialogue from mid June till mid August this year where you are welcome to join the conversation on the future developments of contemporary craft in Australia. Craft is at an interesting junction and this Forum is a pivotal opportunity to make a claim for the future.

Source: Craft Australia, Kate M Murphy, Forum Manager.

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