Blame the Tools

Blame the Tools: Crafty Robots, Well-behaved Implements and Disobedient Devices

8 October 2020, Online

There has been a long-standing recognition in the arts, humanities, and the social sciences, of the importance of tools and implements, and the ways in which they are used to create, transform and enhance objects. The character of these tools – the ways in which tools are handled, the skills and practices that underpin and enable their use and application – has received less attention. Yet it is the character of the tool and its embodied use, that becomes critical in the creation of – and our encounter with – objects and artefacts.

Together with practitioners and academics from across disciplines, this symposium invited makers, curators, crafters, designers, historians, artists, collectors, architects, storytellers, users and social scientists to share understandings of the tool from multiple viewpoints:

• How might digital technologies create new affinities with traditional tools and craft practices, and provide distinctive new ways of creating and encountering material objects?
• What is the importance of imagination and adaptation in the use of traditional and non-traditional tools?
• How does tool use contribute towards structures and practices of co-making and social agency?
• And what part does it play in circular economy?

Speakers:

• Phil Ayres is an architect, researcher and educator, as well as Associate Professor at Centre for Information Technology and Architecture (CITA), Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts
• Katie Bunnell is a ceramic designer, maker and trained researcher. Curator of Whitegold, International Ceramics Prize and Brickfield
• Jason Cleverly is Course Leader for BA Product and Furniture Design at Chelsea College of Arts
• Professor Rebecca Earley is a sustainable fashion textile designer and co-founder of Centre for Circular Design at Chelsea College of Arts, University of the Arts London
• Adrian Friend is an award-winning architect, smart material researcher and educator. He is Programme Director of Material and Spatial Practices, Camberwell, Chelsea, Wimbledon, University of the Arts London
• Dr Bridget Harvey uses making to ask critical questions, generating new understanding and adding meaning through craft. She holds a PhD in ‘Repair-Making: Craft, Narratives, Activism,’ University of the Arts London
• Christian Heath is a Professor at King’s College London, who specialises in fine grained, video-based field studies of social interaction
• Mark Hooper is an award-winning editor, writer and consultant. He is the author of The Story of Tools and the forthcoming Great British Tree Biography (both published by Pavilion)
• Taslim Martin worked in carpentry and joinery for 13 years before attending art school. Taslim has exhibited both nationally and internationally, with works in the British Museum and the Horniman Museum collections
• Christiane Matz is a narrative based illustrator and educator who primarily identifies through drawing
• Alice Naylor has a background in product design and completed an MA in the History of Design. She is a PhD candidate with the University of Portsmouth and the Science Museum
• Gareth Neal is a designer-maker based in Haggerston, London
• Liss C. Werner is the founder of the CyPhyLab and Professor of ‘Bio-Inspired Architecture and Sensoric at the Institute of Architecture’ CPL | BIAS at Technische Universität Berlin

Convened by Jason Cleverly and Adrian Friend.

Project partners: King’s College London and London Craft Week.

Watch the full playlist from the day on YouTube.