HANDSHAKE Project launched a pilot craft writers’ programme, running from January 2020 to December 2021. The online programme will nurture the writing skills of craft and art professionals with a view to channelling their knowledge of craft practices and history into critical and historical writing.

The programme is coordinated by mentor Benjamin Lignel with guest reviewers Namita Gupta Wiggers (Director and Co-Founder Critical Craft Forum; Director, Master of Arts in Craft Studies, Warren Wilson College) and Felicity Milburn (curator at Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū).

At the end of the programme, participants will have built an awareness of historical and contemporary curatorial craft practices; developed their research, observation and critical writing skills; and honed their ability to write in multiple formats.

The programme will combine collective reading sessions, writing briefs and debriefs with online classes and one-on-one tutorials.

This project means to address the need for more reviewers in a growing and vibrant contemporary craft field that welcomes, annually, fresh talents graduating from New Zealand’s visual art-and-design programmes. Today, it seems necessary to nurture the skills of commentators in order to unpack craft practices for the public and express its cultural currency.

Writing MENTEES:

Elle Loui

Hanahiva Rose

Writing MENTORS:

Benjamin Lignel is an educator, writer, curator and artist. Alongside his artistic and curatorial practices, he started contributing essays and op-eds to magazines and publications in 2006, and became a member of Think Tank. A European Initiative for the Applied Arts, in 2009. He was the editor of Art Jewelry Forum between January 2013 and December 2016. During his tenure, Benjamin oversaw the publication of more than 350 essays, reviews and interviews, and edited three books, including the first book-length study of jewelry exhibition-making. He is guest teacher at the Akademie der Bildende Künste (Nürnberg), Alchimia (Florence), Warren Wilson College (Swannanoa) and has conducted numerous workshops on creative and critical writing (in Italy, the United states, and New Zealand). Ben is currently working with co-editor Namita Wiggers towards a publication on jewelry and gender. He is on the editorial advisory board of Norwegians Crafts (Oslo) and of the Journal of Jewellery Research (Loughborough). He lives in Montreuil (France).

Namita Gupta Wiggers is a writer, curator, and educator based in Portland, OR. Wiggers is the Director of the Master of Arts in Critical and Historical Craft Studies at Warren Wilson College, North Carolina. This low residency program, the first of its kind, focuses on critical and historical craft studies. She is the Director and Co-Founder of Critical Craft Forum, an online platform for dialogue and exchange, CCF has organized annual sessions on craft at College Art Association since 2010. From 2004-14, Wiggers served as Curator (2004-2012) and then Director and Chief Curator (2012-14), Museum of Contemporary Craft, Portland, OR. She contributes to online and in-print journals and books, and serves on the Editorial Boards of Garland and Norwegian Crafts. From 2014-18, Wiggers served as the Exhibition Reviews Editor, The Journal of Modern Craft. She is a former Trustee of the American Craft Council and Center for Craft, and currently serves on the Board of Directors of Haystack Mountain School of Crafts. She is the editor of the forthcoming Companion in Contemporary Craft with Wiley Blackwell Publishers (2020).

Felicity Milburn is a Curator at Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū, where she works collaboratively with artists on a wide range of projects, from temporary installations through to large-scale survey exhibitions. She writes regularly for the Gallery’s exhibition catalogues, website and quarterly magazine and also contributes to local and international publications, including Art New Zealand, Takahē, Landfall and World Sculpture News. Her essays have featured in books on several leading New Zealand artists, including Joanna Braithwaite, Séraphine Pick, Lisa Walker and, most recently, Jacqueline Fahey: Say Something!, which sold out its first print-run. Between 2015 and 2017 she was Art Editor for Takahē magazine, a long-running, not-for-profit New Zealand literary magazine. In that role, she commissioned and edited essays by established and emerging writers.  She is currently working with ceramic artist Cheryl Lucas on an exhibition and book project.