Irish Craft Heroes Publication
50 Makers x 50 Years
I was delighted last year to be nominated and selected as one of the fifty Irish Craft Heroes for the exhibition that has toured around various sites in Ireland and is currently at the Botanic Gardens in Belfast. Now a sumptuous and comprehensive book has been published covering the fifty years since the Design & Craft Council of Ireland was founded. I am proud to say that by coincidence I also began my working career in 1971 at the Kilkenny Design Workshops after graduating from my Ceramic degree in Belfast. This was to be the start of my career as a professional potter so in many ways the book also marks my own fifty year anniversary as a maker.
The Irish Craft Heroes book launched on August 6th 2022 celebrates the Design & Crafts Council Ireland’s fiftieth anniversary, supporting and celebrating makers since 1971. The book features profiles of the fifty Irish Craft Heroes, stunning images of their work, and a timeline of key developments over the years.
The DCCI National Design & Craft Gallery developed a project that included an outdoor touring exhibition and a detailed publication charting the evolution of craft and design in Ireland over the last fifty years. Its purpose was to pay homage to the makers whose work has made Irish craft what it is today. More broadly, the aim of the project was to raise public awareness of the richness and diversity of Irish craft practice and to demonstrate the value of craft as a part of Irish material culture and identity.
The book presents a clear history and trajectory from the beginning of the DCCI, following the 1970 World Crafts Council General Assembly in Dublin, and its journey over five decades supporting makers. It conveys the growth of the craft and design sector in Ireland through its creativity, innovation, resilience and collaborative spirit.
Through a public open call, DCCI invited its members and the wider craft and design community to nominate their ‘Irish Craft Heroes’: ‘makers whose work has significant legacy, has heralded new approaches or has changed the way we look at the world’. Through the public form, and invited submissions from sector experts, more than six hundred nominations were received. Following the public nominations, an expert committee was convened, and charged with the difficult task of narrowing the selection to fifty makers. A number of those who were nominated for their substantial contributions in other ways to the sector are acknowledged in the publication as ‘Irish Craft Champions’; others feature in the ‘Timeline of Irish Craft’, which charts the development of the sector by identifying fifty key moments in the recent history of Irish craft.
The Irish Craft Heroes book is available to purchase from 5th August priced at €35 from Design & Crafts Council Ireland and the National Design & Craft Gallery.
