Art or craft?

[BLAHMAN]

For those that build rifles, do you see yourself as partaking in art or are you rendering an item as a craft? In other words, do you picture the rifle you build as an artform or do you see it as a craft and an expression of craftmanship? Do you think that craftmanship can be regarded as an artform, much akin to a painted picture or sculpted item?

 

[Eric Krewson]

Right now I am starting a rifle and view it as a craft. Other crafty things I have done in the past(duck decoy carving, wood bow making) started as a craft and progressed to an art form as my skill level increased.

 

[rich pierce]

Craft. I view art as objects made primarily for their visual effects (or auditory, if we want to include music). Example: I consider fine pottery that is useful to be craft. If a sculpture with the same design motifs but you can't carry something in it, it's art to me.

I would consider a fine gun to be art if its chief aim was to be visually pleasing, and some fine guns, highly sculptured, engraved, decorated, inlaid with gold, etc were and still are made primarily for that purpose.

 

[nit wit]

My work resembles a butcher shop!
NIT WIT :haha:

 

[vradin]

For those that build rifles, do you see yourself as partaking in art or are you rendering an item as a craft?

I only ever built one rifle, and that was from a kit, but I have done a pile of other woodworking, and it's both. Art and craft involved in the working of wood into a pleasing and useful form.

Most of my work is done on a lathe, so speaking to that as related to stock building it's all about the taking off of materials, rather than say- cabinetry which ADDS to an ampty space. You start with a slab off a tree, keep taking off wood until it takes some shape, refine to a form, and decorate till you're finished. The art comes in knowing HOW MUCH, WHEN and WHERE to take wood off, and when to say "I'm done here". The craft is being able to do it smoothly, efficiently, and ending with the same number of digits that you started with.

Just :m2c:
vic

 

[rootnuke]

Functional Art.

It performs a function and looks good while its doing it.

 

[amccall]

Being my first name is Art and I know there are pieces of me in my rifle, blood, sweat, tears and mabye a piece of thumb. I would say that it is not just a piece of "Art" but pieces of Art. :crackup:
I have labeled my masterpiece "stick that goes boom and misses". I can't call it craftmanship because that denotes some type of knowledge, abillity or skill and I am only at the bleeding, sweating and crying stage right now. ::

 

[CrackStock]

In my case, it is neither. The best that could be said is that it is tool making.

CS

 

[TANSTAAFL]

:m2c:I am a gun stocker, nothing more, nothing less.

 

[TANSTAAFL]

There was a quote from days of yore that went something like: "Ye shall know a man by his weapons." To me it translates out as, "real men don't use funky art weapons," they use functional tools, and form follows function.

 

[Packdog]

I believe that building a gun is a craft. The way it is decorated is art or at least can be for some but not me. Ha-Ha

 

[vradin]

I have this hanging in my shop at home.

A man who works with his hands is a laborer;
a man who works with his hands and his brain is a craftsman;
but a man who works with his hands and his brain and his heart is an artist.

Louis Nizer (1902-1994)
- - - - - - - - - - - - -

I've seen a lot of pictures here lately of some fine looking firearms, bags, knives, etc. It appears to me that not a one of them was made without some careful thought and loving care... so despite the self-depreciation most of us seem to show, and the functionality of the "tools" we have made, it still remains that there is an element of art in all of the works, highly carved and figured or simple and plain.

:imo: :m2c: and even :blah:
vic

 

[scott k]

A craftsman Would have no trouble putting a gun together. like Doing the inleting drilling holes filing sanding staining and finishing the wood. Stuff like that is right up a craftsman alley. But it takes a artist to make the lines of a gun flow and look right. look at a stock and know where to take off wood and where to leave it. I think it takes a craftsman to put a gun together and a artist to make it look right. :m2c: btw I'm no artist
Lehigh..

 

[Zonie]

There was a quote from days of yore that went something like: "Ye shall know a man by his weapons." To me it translates out as, "real men don't use funky art weapons," they use functional tools, and form follows function.

I like the quote, but I don't know that the translation is the one that I would use.

That one man may carry a plain Stevins shotgun and another carries a fine Holland & Holland Double, does indeed say things about the individuals even though both guns will do the same job with the same efficiency.

As to whether building these guns is an art or a craft, I must say it is both.

A craftsman can assemble a gun with incredible precision but it may still look like a barrel, lock and trigger skillfully attached in the correct places, to a semi hacked on 2 X 6.

An artest may make or shape the smooth, flowing lines of wood so it seems to almost be alive with grace and carvings but it may still look like sculpture with a lock, barrel and trigger nailed and wired in place in a couple of troughs.

Even the simplest plainest muzzleloader can be a work of art without carvings, inlays and fancy finishes, but the gun with carvings, inlays and fancy finishes should be admired as a step above the ordinary. :imo:

 

[TANSTAAFL]

Plain Jane flintlock NW trade guns in one form or another were in everyday use by men whose lives depended on them well into the last century, even after the .30-30 and other smokeless powder burners. Why? They functioned as designed, got the job done, and did it very well.

It is my thought that highly ornate long guns were built mostly for the vanity trade, especially for the Indians, some who were as vain as any La dame de Paris de la nuit.

 

[Terry Zboril]

Blahman,

How about "ARTISAN", a combination of craft and art. Hands and heart and brain.

A muzzleloader built of pipe and a pine 2x8 that fits the shooter, that will shoot well, is a delight, and will do it's job.

Another gun, expertly engraved, inlaid with two pounds of gold, pearl, and silver that will not shoot where you point it, or even function well, is simply Wallhanging Art.

I tend to combine the two. I will get done with a gun that I swore would be "plain", and just cannot help myself from putting some "foo-foo's on that blank canvas of a striped stock. (I guess it IS a bit of vanity). I think many of the old makers were the same.

Cake without icing eats mighty fine, but it don't take that long to put the icing on, if you are so equipped.
:m2c:
Terry

 

[Darkhorse]

I build for function first, then fine lines and wood finish, but always function first. Personally I don't care for a lot of carving on my working rifles. And as such I don't consider my rifles as art.
BUT, art seems to be in the eye of the beholder. I have had several people who have only seen production guns, that when looking at and holding one of my rifles have proclaimed; "This is a work of art. How can you drag it through the woods? It should be hung over the mantle."
On the other hand, a lot of folks who have become initiated to finely decorated rifles would consider mine plain jane, with just a little fancy wood.
I just want to get it right without any glaring mistakes.