Vlad Ionescu is postdoctoral fellow in archi- What is the meaning of craftsmanship in the era of digital

tectural theory at the Faculty of Architecture

and Arts (Hasselt University). His current
research investigates the conceptual and ar-
tistic implications of the adaptive reuse of
the built environment. He previously studied
philosophy of art at the University of Leuven
where he defended his thesis on modern
production? Applied Arts as Implied Art is a critical reflection
on artistic creativity and its cultural significance today. In
the light of a confrontation between the art theory of Aloïs
VLAD IONESCU
Riegl and Frank Lloyd Wright, the essay debates the role
of technology in craftsmanship and its impact on artmak-

VLAD IONESCU
art historiography, focusing on the work of
ing. Referring to the aesthetics of Paul Valéry and the design
Aloïs Riegl, Heinrich Wölfflin and Wilhelm
Worringer. Between 2009 and 2013, he
co-translated and co-edited the series Jean-
theory of Jacques Vienot, the author proposes a contempo-
rary interpretation of applied arts as implied art, a form of
Applied arts, implied art
François Lyotard. Writings on Contemporary
art between fine art and design that describes human life, its
Arts and Artists (Leuven University Press).
His research has been published in various
edited volumes and in the Journal of Art
experiences and the occasional poverty thereof. Arts appliqués, art impliqué
Historiography, ARS, Art History Supplement,
Deleuze Studies, Architectural Histories, A+ Quel est le sens de l’artisanat à l’ère de la productibilité nu-
and Cultural Politics.
mérique ? Arts appliqués, art impliqué est une réflexion cri-
tique sur la créativité artistique et son importance culturelle

Applied arts, implied art - Arts appliqués, art impliqué

aujourd’hui. A la lumière d’une confrontation entre la théo-
Vlad Ionescu est chercheur postdoctoral
dans le domaine de la théorie architectu- rie de l’art de Aloïs Riegl et Frank Lloyd Wright, l’essai dis-
rale à la Faculté d’Architecture et des Arts cute le rôle de la technologie dans le design artisanal et son
(Université de Hasselt). Ses recherches ac-
tuelles concernent les implications concep-
impact sur la création artistique. Se référant à l’esthétique
tuelles et artistiques de la réutilisation adap- de Paul Valéry et de la théorie de la conception de Jacques
tative de l’environnement bâti. Il a étudié la Viénot, l’auteur propose une interprétation contemporaine
philosophie des arts à l’Université de Louvain
où il a défendu une thèse sur l’historiogra- des arts appliqués comme art impliqué, une forme d’art entre
phie de l’art moderne, en se concentrant les beaux-arts et le design qui raconte des histoires sur la vie
sur les travaux de Aloïs Riegl, Heinrich
Wölfflin et Wilhelm Worringer. Entre 2009
humaine, ses expériences et de la pauvreté occasionnelle de
et 2013, il a co-traduit et co-édité la série ceux-ci.
Jean-François Lyotard. Écrits sur Arts et Artistes
Contemporains (Leuven University Press). Ses
recherches ont été publiées dans divers vo-
lumes et notamment dans le Journal of Art
Historiography, ARS, Art History Supplement,
Deleuze Studies, Architectural Histories, A+ et
Cultural Politics. ISBN/EAN: 978-90-76714-48-6

A&S/books - Ghent University

www.AndSbooks.ugent.be

Distribution: www.exhibitionsinternational.be 9 789076 714486 A&S/books A&S/books

APPLIED ARTS COVER.indd All Pages 18/11/2016 11:48:29

 VLAD IONESCU

Applied arts, implied art

Craftsmanship and technology in the age
of art industry

Arts appliqués, art impliqué

Création artisanale et technologie à l’époque
de l’industrie de l’art

A&S / books

2016

APPLIED ARTS 3NOV.indd 3 14/11/2016 20:57:55

 9

Distinctions
Applied arts, decorative arts and handicrafts, arts and
crafts, ornamental arts, cottage industry and industrial de-
sign are practices that have often been distinguished from
the ine arts. he Greek diferentiated between crafts (that
required technè or “know-how”) and scientiic knowledge
(or episteme); the main goal of the distinction was to dis-
cern between the contingent situations that determine the
ield of technique from the necessary truths of science.
However, the dualistic thinking in terms of “ine” and “ap-
plied arts” is a modern symptom: whatever is done without
a pre-established purpose represents pure beauty and what-
ever bears an external goal represents adjacent beauty. A
Kantian ixation with typologies even though it was Kant
- the father of modern aesthetics - who illustrated the free
beauty with ‘designs à la grecque, the foliage for borders or
on wallpapers.’1 However, no epoch before the Renaissance
has even identiied the craftsman as diferent from other art-
ists. To employ artefacts within broader social practices was
something that was regulated by the guilds: painters and
stonemasons worked within the broader cultural context
where their art gave form to a religious ritual that includ-
ed an entire community.2 Craftsmanship was just one layer

1. Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, translated by Paul

Guyer, Eric Matthews, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, §16,
pp. 114.
2. See Peter Korn, Why We Make hings and Why It Matters. he
Education of a Craftsman, Boston, David R. Godine Publisher, 2013,
pp. 35 f.

APPLIED ARTS 3NOV.indd 9 14/11/2016 20:57:55

 10
of a homogenous society where ‘art’ was woven with other
practices, religious or practical, designing a holy water font
or a cupboard, panting a fresco or embellishing a ciborium.
During the 19th century, the distinction between ap-
plied and pure arts began to assume more overtly political
and ethical implications. he Arts and Crafts movement
cannot just be admired for their personalised ornaments;
the writings of Morris and Ruskin constitute a mature form
of social critique that resisted the inhuman degradation of
the worker’s life and of the artefact’s quality. he quality of
the made object was organically linked to the social condi-
tions of the worker. Whereas the tool has always been an
inherent part of a craftsman’s activity, the industrial revolu-
tion introduced the complex machine.
Nevertheless, the potter’s wheel is also a machine that
has been used since the 5th century BC. In principle, the
potter’s wheel does not seem that diferent from the con-
temporary 3D printers; they both transform a material by
moving it around a formatting force, the hand or the laser.
Nevertheless, in the case of the 3D printer, the pressure of
the potter’s hand is substituted by the mechanical force of a
machine. he lived body of the worker is no longer organ-
ically linked to the made object. his dissociation between
the body of the worker and the produced object has of-
ten been the cause of social and political debates. An entire
Marxist philosophy is based on the problematic quantiica-
tion of the time that the worker invests in the produced ob-
jects.3 But how does complex machines, like the 3D printer,
alter the quality of the artefact? And has the distinction be-

3. See the work of Jacques Rancière, especially Le Partage du Sensible.

Esthétique et politique, Paris, La fabrique éditions, 2000.

APPLIED ARTS 3NOV.indd 10 14/11/2016 20:57:55

 11
tween applied and ine arts retained the former outside the
history of art? To these and other questions, the following
paragraphs attempt to provide a few hypothetical answers.

Domesticity
Emerging within the background of the industrial rev-
olution, the Arts and Crafts movement maintained a con-
sistent distrust towards the qualitative and aesthetic con-
sequences of technology. he criterion of reference was a
Romanticised medieval age where the unique crafted object
was the rule. Whereas the Gothic stonemasons created in-
imitable and long-lasting objects, the mechanical reproduc-
tion of a pattern generates cheap eigies. However, there
is an alternative to this disconsolate chapter of modern art
history that has been exhaustibly researched. Towards the
end of the 19th century, an art historian relected on the ap-
plied arts in quite a dispassionate fashion. For Aloïs Riegl,
technology was an integral part of what we call applied arts.
he Austrian art historian began his career as curator of the
textile collection at the Imperial and Royal Museum for Art
and Design (the current Museum für angewandte Kunste)
that opened its doors in 1864. Prior to his highly inluen-
tial history of ornament, Aloïs Riegl researched the impact
of modernity on traditional craftsmanship in continental
Europe.
Even though Riegl did not intend to resist the deper-
sonalising efects of the industrial revolution, he did reject
a powerful intellectual paradigm, namely the materialistic
explanation of art. Within such a paradigm, a tapestry is
understood to depend on the used material and technique,

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