Part of the acclaimed series of anthologies which document major themes and ideas in contemporary art. A vital resource through which to understand the ways technologies, materials, techniques and tools are investigated through the lens of craft in contemporary art. Craft is a contested concept in art history and a vital category through which to understand contemporary art. Through "craft", materials, techniques and tools are investigated and their histories explored in order to reflect on the politics of labour and on the extraordinary complexity of the made world around us. This anthology offers an ethnography of craft, surveying its shape-shifting identities in the context of progressive art and design through writings by artists and makers, and drawing on poetry, fiction, anthropology and sociology. Reflections on new technologies and materials, lost and found worlds of handwork and the politics of work all throw light on "craft" as process, product and ideology. "In recent times 'craft' has been employed stategically--to confront issues of gender or uneven global development, to make a stand against artistic academicism, or to engage with making processes, some distinctly archaic, employed to suggest the abject and the everyday. This anthology offers an ethnography of craft, surveying its shape-shifting identities in the context of progressive art and design. Reflections on new technologies, lost and found worlds of handwork and the politics of work all throw light on 'craft' as process, product and ideology."--back cover.