This story originally appeared on the Gents Cafe Newsletter. You can subscribe here.
Ask yourself: are you a creator, or merely a consumer? Have you crafted something with your hands? A young Arthur Lochmann pondered on these questions when, just like many of us, he felt stranded through the waves of modern life. At the time, Arthur was graduating in Philosophy and Law; however, he yearned for something concrete, and that’s where carpentry found him. Amidst the rush and chaos of Postmodernity, he took hold of his hammer and chisel and got to work. The abundance of concreteness rejuvenated him, never had he felt as connected to the physical world. His first book “La vie solide. La charpente comme éthique du faire” is his testimony.
“Craftsmanship is the polar opposite of alienated work”.
Lochmann found purpose in the vivid aromas of wood and the tried-and-true techniques which go back millennia. But most importantly he did, while too many of us are stuck barely thinking. As he quotes Matthew B. Crawford and his book “Shop class as Soulcraft”, developing a concrete relationship with objects leaves the door open for a broader perspective: not just the consumer’s one, that of the creator.
How many times have we contemplated our work? And how often is it a work that will last for decades, if not centuries to come? Craftsmanship gifts us a hint of our precarious human condition, it makes us appreciate the short lifespan we are given, easily surpassed by a well measured wood joint.
Traveling back to ancient Greece, we find their term for artisans to be demiurgòs, meaning public work. Their antique crafting knowledge passed through generations; it was the heritage of the community.
And it still is.
Although we may now see ourselves threatened by the up-and-coming arrival of Artificial Intelligence and job automation, crafts protect us from the risk of substitution. Whenever we find a “Handmade” stamp on a crafted product, we will recognize the pride, the know-how and the appreciation behind it.
Whether you are going to appreciate it as the buyer, or as the maker, I hope you, too, will rejoice at the sight of a truly human work.
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