Craft Studies

The curriculum puts a lot of emphasis on a student’s individual work that is supervised by a specialized studio advisor. The programme offers plenty of artistic freedom but also the responsibility to direct one’s own work in a fast-paced study environment. There’s plenty of room for experimenting and exploring different materials, but the main focus rests on one clear craft practice. The study is based on continuous feedback from one’s advisor as well as regular critique sessions among fellow students.

Craft Studies collaborates with and leans on the competence and traditions of the Accessories and Bookbinding, Ceramics, Glass, Jewellery and Blacksmithing, Textile and Fashion departments and specialised labs at EKA. The students’ practice is not limited to these studios but should incorporate any materials or methods needed.

There are also many practical and theoretical output opportunities during the two years. Students will conduct two joint exhibitions as well as a final solo exhibition. The first year will end with the publication of a volume of the student’s papers, and the second year will result in a written thesis.

The programme aims to incorporate as many opportunities for creative wanderings and hands-on research as possible. This entails a longer 3-week nomadic fieldwork abroad during the first year as well as many shorter field trips in Estonia and elsewhere throughout the studies. These material explorations attempt to bring artists into direct contact with the varied materials they might use in their own work, experiencing their birthplace instead of having them simply shipped anonymously to their studio back home. The goal is to give students the opportunity to familiarize themselves with foreign craft practices, traditional and contemporary ways of making, and learn directly from other cultures and makers.

The programme takes a lot of inspiration from the threefold craft theory (by Eik Hermann) of legwork, handwork, and headwork. Legwork involves all the different ways of wandering aimlessly, gathering inspiration and materials, be it somewhere physically on-site or spiritually and mentally among memories and influences. Handwork is the most known of the three and encompasses all the ways of approaching material, making something out of it, using one’s hands as well as tools and other prosthetic objects. Headwork entails the processes of making sense of the material world – metaphysically, politically, culturally – and reflecting consciously on one’s own work and positioning oneself as an artist in the craft field. The programme attempts to incorporate and promote all three in equal measure.

Craft theory seminars focus on a wide array of different concepts and frameworks: material agency, object-oriented-ontology, new materialism, phenomenology, tactile knowledge, post-colonialism, fluid identities, environmental approaches, etc.