When is a piece of art not a craft?

What’s the difference between art and craft? Between an artist and an artisan?

This is a distinction that I’d never given much thought to until about a year ago. Newly hired at the Community Center, a place full of “arts and crafts,” I was intrigued. What exactly made something a piece of art and not a craft, and how did they feel about one versus the other? The bottom line of their explanation was that art essentially existed on a higher plane of complexity; that art had more meaning; that only art would be displayed in a museum. 

That explanation didn’t feel satisfying, and so I did some internet research – the gist of which all fell along similar lines: a piece of art is unique, whereas a craft is more easily reproduced. Art is made for the sake of beauty and meaning, whereas a craft is made with some kind of purpose or use. Art is about the self-expression and creativity of the artist, but craft is about learned skill.

I get it. When I knit a sweater from a pattern, I’m hand-crafting a garment for my son to wear (or, in all honesty, for him to leave stashed in his closet because it’s too “scratchy”). I’m not making art. But I don’t think the difference is always that clear-cut – and sometimes, I think, the distinction itself has some kind of purpose; it’s meant to make a statement about the value of an item or its maker. 

Think about some of the most valuable pieces of art you might see in a museum today. A lot of those famous portraits – the Mona Lisa, the Night Watch – were made on commission for wealthy patrons who wanted a likeness on their wall to convey status and power. I don’t think anyone today would dispute that those are works of art. But these paintings weren’t purely made for the sake of beauty, let alone for the artist’s self-expression. I wonder if they were considered art in their own day, given that they had such a functional role to play. The same question applies to Ming vases from 15th century China, or 18th century Ottoman rugs.

And today, when someone creates a beautiful print or photograph – something that expresses the creator’s unique worldview but can be reproduced – is it not art if more than one person might have a ‘copy’ of it in their home? If I purchase a bowl from a potter, and I put it on my dining room table to hold fruit, does that mean it’s a craft? Is the mosaic tilework on the wall of a Moroccan living room the work of an artist, or artisan? And in the bookstore, is there a qualitative difference between fiction and nonfiction because one is a description of the outside world and the other was born from a spark of inspiration within the writer’s brain? 

My point is that, at least to a considerable extent, the difference between art and craft is in the eye of the beholder. I think it’s bound up with our tendency to differentiate between work done with the mind and work done with your hands – white collar versus blue collar – and all kinds of other power dynamics, including notions of who gets to be called ‘creative’ and who doesn’t; who is considered ‘cultured’, and who is not. And those dynamics are always worth questioning.