It’s a Match!
Cat Rossi and Alessandro Gerosa on (Post)Craft

Cat Rossi will push us to question how we understand the turn to making, sewing, and growing in the early 21st century. She will discuss what is meant by the term “post-craft” and how it can be useful to make sense of the popularity of craft today amongst designers, producers, and consumers alike. Rossi’s talk will explore how we can understand craft following its re-entry into the economic, cultural, political and manufacturing mainstreams in the 21st century. The craft revival of the 2000s, which saw craft once again embraced by design, art, architecture and other art forms, is now not just another revival but seemingly the start of a long-term reconfiguration of craft’s place in the world. Her talk will explore some foundational ideas of modern and post craft and explore how a turn to making is remaking design in the 21^st century.

In his presentation, Alessandro Gerosa will explore the concept of “neo-craft” and contextualize it within the current resurgence of interest in crafts, both in academia and society at large. Leading the popularity of the neo-craft economy are consumer goods like beer, wine, and artisanal food—typically extraneous to the handicrafts recognized and safeguarded by national and international craft councils and organizations. However, what defines neo-craft is not merely the membership in a specific category but rather a complex relationship of discursive materiality, where symbolic and material meanings and rewards intertwine. In order to make sense of it, Gerosa’s talk will argue the necessity of deeply contextualizing the neo-craft economy within the developments of late modern capitalism. Finally, it will debate the implications of the rise of neo-craft vis-à-vis artistic crafts and examine the future of crafts more broadly.

Biographical Notes

Dr Cat Rossi is a design historian, Professor of Architecture, and Research Lead in the School of Architecture and Design at UCA Canterbury. A curator, writer and educator, her interests include post-war Italian design and craft, club culture, feminism, environmentalism, and contemporary design and architecture. Her publications include Crafting Design in Italy (MUP, 2015) and the co-edited The Italian Avant-Garde and Post-Craft (Sternberg Press, 2013 and 2022). She has co/curated exhibitions including the touring show Night Fever: Designing Club Culture 1960-Today (Vitra Design Museum, 2018 - 2022) and At Home: Panoramas de nos vies domestiques (Saint-Etienne Design Biennale, 2022).

Dr Alessandro Gerosa is Assistant Professor in Cultural Sociology at the University of Milan. He is the author of The Hipster Economy: Taste and Authenticity in Late Modern Capitalism (UCL Press) and other academic publications. His research aims to achieve a better understanding of how people seek authentic and meaningful lives in late modern capitalism through a joint analysis of taste, working practices, and digital cultures.