The School of ______
Applied Handcraft
The School of Applied Handcraft recognises that our evolution has been steered by our hands, or more specifically by the tools and extensions-of-self created by our hands. Our hands serve us as our primary means of making and changing our worlds, 'they are the instruments of executive action, our tools, they allow us to manipulate the world'[1]. Building upon this understanding The School of Applied Handcraft teaches and facilitates the means to create new knowledge primarily with our hands and to think critically through the associated practices utilising our hands. The school keeps idle hands busy, thinks through making applies rules of thumb and deploys bricolage.
Current research themes of the school include questions and concerns for; 'Are we intelligent because we have hands (Anaxagoras)?' / 'Do we have hands because we are intelligent, as a means to perpetuate our will instrumentally (Aristotle)? / 'What evolutionary psycho-physical role do our hands currently play in navigating our cognitive realities within digital worlds through touch screen gesture and type (Dualism)?'.
[1] Hands, Darian Leader, Hamish Hamilton 2016