arts and crafts

Last week Nancy Friday commented on the post titled Pennywise. She told us about Artists, Craftsmen and Technocrats by Patricia Pitcher.

Here's a blurb from the book cover that gives an idea of what's inside ...

Pitcher paints the portraits of the three types of leaders found in organizations: the Artist, the Craftsman, and the Technocrat.

The Artist is people-oriented, open-minded, intuitive, and visionary.

The Craftsman is humane, dedicated, knowledgeable, and wise.

The Artist and Craftsman are "fellow-travellers".

But the Technocrat is another story. Detail-oriented, rigid, methodical, and hardheaded, the Technocrat is the enemy of both the Artist and the Craftsman. His/her analytical thinking leaves no room for fresh ideas and new pathways; he/she follows an uncompromising set of rules he/she believes are right.

To the Technocrat, the Artist is out of control, "nuts", and the Craftsman is old-fashioned.

Too many Technocrats are admitted into the corridors of power.

This week Suzanne Ahearne sent me this link to this video about "Cultural Recovery." (There is a text version here.)

Suzanne also told me that Arlene Goldbard and other community artists and craftspeople have been invited to the White House in mid-May to discuss the ways in which art and craft can help heal what the technocrats have wreaked (my words :P ).

No sign of any artists and craftspeople being invited into the corridors of power on this side of the border but Yann Martel continues, unbidden, to send Stephen Harper good books.