The MACR PApers

Being Here

Link to This is Not a Retreat, co-edited by Ben Lignel and Namita Gupta Wiggers

Link to Teaching Questions: Lisa Jarrett and Namita Gupta Wiggers in Conversation in This Is Not a Retreat, edited by Ben Lignel and Namita Wiggers

Link to Designing the Plane as We Flew It—A Discussion on the MACR Program Publications in This Is Not a Retreat, edited by Ben Lignel and Namita Wiggers

Link to Interview with Namita Gupta Wiggers: A Focused Oral History on the MACR Creation in Making Room, Making Connections, Making History: Editors' Note," Reclaiming the Center: Making Way for Black Craft, edited by Jill DiMassimo and Joanna Weiss

Link to Archive in Encyclopedia of Craft Studies (Abridged), edited by Rena Tom

Intro to The MACR Papers:

You have just entered the publication headquarters: in a heap near the entrance, a binge of bulldog clips and notepads, of see-thru sleeves and colored pens. School desks and a copy machine stand to attention in the room, and eye the whiteboard with suspicion (why does it always get all the exclamation marks?). You ask yourself: where do we go from here? And: Will people come? (MatLab IV Syllabus, Spring 2023, closing semester)

The final MACR program publication is a closing and a beginning. MACR is how the MA in Critical Craft Studies, the first low-residency graduate program focused on critical craft studies, was known at Warren Wilson College, Swannanoa, NC. Taking our cue from MoMA Librarian David Senior, we are thinking of “publications [as] archival documents of actual spaces or happenings that become […] emblematic of a certain hospitality to new forms of art and expression.”1 The “new forms” are, in this case, the learning, researching, and intermittent living together that took place over the five years of the program’s first iteration—the “Warren Wilson College years,” you might say—from the fall of 2017 to the spring of 2023.

—What if, this time around, each graduating student created their own publication?
—Yes, and …

At the helm of this collection of seven publications is the 2023 graduating cohort—Miriam Devlin, Jill DiMassimo, Jennifer Hand, Beryl Perron-Feller, Rena Tom, Joanna Weiss, and Tina Wiltsie—joined by program director Namita Gupta Wiggers and core faculty Ben Lignel. Individually, or in pairs, we engaged in the complex gymnastics of looking in the rearview mirror to describe some things learned, while looking ahead to frame them for future readerships. In Belgian feminist philosopher Françoise Colin’s words, this is a “heritage without a testament.”2

“This conference presentation outlines plans in progress to develop a new approach to craft history and theory, one which emphasizes craft’s longstanding global importance, and which leaves room for shifts and complexity, moving towards canons and away from a single canonical approach.”3

We have referred internally to The MACR Papers as an “archive,” a “library,” and landed finally on “papers,” to center the rich and messy nature of this multi-authored reflection on, and with, the program’s actual archive.4 “Messy” points toward the editors’ discussions on the limits of siloed content organization. The students’ line-ups—of commissioned as well as reprinted texts—were conceived in full awareness of the knowledge that arises from the juxtaposition of texts that were not meant to be juxtaposed: their work lies as much in those connections as it does in the heavy lifting of producing their publications. But we asked ourselves: could we tend to the connections that exist both within, and across, the seven editorial projects? We understood that the adhesive nature of each publication could benefit from another miscellaneous sorting system, one that would echo the multiple disciplinary allegiances of craft studies. With this in mind, we created a keyword navigation system for you, dear reader, in order to generate fruitful contiguity,5 while not pretending that all the “gaps in the shelves” are filled.6 The resulting interface highlights keyword navigation and lets each one of the 99 downloadable articles carry its own unique set of faceted coordinates within The MACR Papers’ wider semantic constellation. As you browse—through tables of content or keywords—we invite you to choose, save, and print the articles that meet with your interest, and thus to assemble your own “MACR Papers.”

“Many hands, many minds all the time.”
—Ulrike Müller7

This is our most ambitious publishing project to date, by far. The students pulled it off while working on Practicum—no small feat—and produced editorial projects that very much reflect the thinkers they are and the conversations they have chosen to be part of. Thinking about the intellectual communities and support networks we all relied on makes us want to thank the world and their cousin, or so it might seem. Alongside the knowledge holders who are cited in the Papers, we want to name you—friend, reader, educator, mentor, and collaborator. You are important to us, and if we missed you in this list, we beg forgiveness. You belong in a roll call of the field of craft studies, which this program served. Thank you for being here.

To consult previous publication projects, go to www.macraftstudieswwc.com.
The entire program, from 2017 to 2023, is “archived” on Instagram @macraftstudieswwc.