BONUS: Craft Lab 2025 | Curator’s POV Pt 1

Welcome to Make Good Things Happen, a podcast for makers in business presented to
you by Angela Dalton and Renee Baker.
Welcome to Make Good Things Happen. It’s lovely to be back. My name is Angela and
joining me of course is Renee and we are very pleased to present a few bonus
episodes where we’re going to be talking about Craft Lab 2025 and Renee is
interviewing me or something along those lines. Is that right? Yeah, we’re just using
that term loosely. We have the opportunity to actually have a conversation about
craft lab because that’s something that we don’t really get to do very often these
days is just to have a bit of a chat. And it’s something that’s taken up a fair
chunk of your time and I’ve heard a lot about but probably haven’t really heard the
full story and figured that might be the same for some of our listeners as well
who’ve perhaps heard whispers and words and snippets on your social media but are
maybe asking themselves, “But wait, what actually is Craft Lab anyway?” But yes, I
wanted to start just having the opportunity to hear from the beginning the basics as
to what Craft Lab 2025 actually is because I think I know from my experience
anyway, when working on projects, sometimes we are so consumed in what they are that
we forget that it’s not always obvious to other people what exactly is going on.
And that’s just a good thing to note for anyone listening, really. But yeah, I
think just having the opportunity to hear directly from the curator’s mouth what,
what craft lab is and where it sits, I suppose, in the creative landscape to start
there. Thank you for giving me the chance to talk a bit more about something that
has been quite consuming for the last nine months in particular. So Craft Lab,
first and foremost, is a sector development program designed by the city of Ballarat,
as in the council, the local government. The program has been initiated in order to
maintain in Ballarat’s designation as UNESCO Creative City of Craft and Folk Art.
And the sector development program, we put a call out for practitioners who have
either lived or do live, worked or do work, studied or do study in Ballarat.
And very specifically, the local government area of Ballarat, the practitioners need
to have either be here or have been here in some way, shape or form a connection.
And of the expressions of interest that we receive, we curate a bunch of them. This
year it was 18. Those craft practitioners are then selected to go through a
professional development program which is provided by the city of Ballarat in
conjunction with our partnership that is arranged with Craft Victoria. As part of
that they all receive training and mentoring directly in a variety of professional
development areas. So it might be how to write an artist CV and how to apply for
things and such as exhibitions and so on. That’s primarily what Craft Lab is and
what the origin story is of Craft Lab. And it started in 2020,
which must have been quite a challenge, I imagine, since it was smackbang in the
middle of what we all know now as a pandemic. That’s what’s at its core is a
commitment to maintaining or creating a structure that provides economic sustainability
and viability for craftspeople. And crafts people. We have people such as jewelers,
milliners we had last year, furniture makers, ceramicists. Ballarat is a very rich
area when it comes to ceramicists. It’s got a strong tradition with ceramics because
it’s a city that lives on clay. So it has a great tradition of ceramics and
pottery. This year we had some textile practitioners as well And someone who casts
glass and creates sculptures, someone who makes pigments for paints. And yeah, it’s a
really interesting program. And so, because I think from, again, like I’m viewing
this from the outside perspective, because I guess maybe for some even further
context, most of what you, a listener would have known of us, Angela and Renee, is
that we work together on almost everything that we do. And Craft Lab is primarily
your project, there has been, you know, little snippets of input here and there from
me, but not to make this about me, but so much so that it’s actually so weird for
me that I don’t get to see or be there and be part of it. Like not because I –
It’s weird for me too. It’s weird for me too. Let’s face it. I am constantly at a
bit of a loss as to where my mate is all through the whole process. Not because I
would like any kind of accolades more just because I want to see what you’ve done
because it actually has come across so awesome. And I guess that’s where I want to
know more because you’ve explained about the sector development. And so it’s almost
like this program that the practitioners go through in order to go deeper into some
of the more business aspects of how to run their craft, I suppose. So again, like
these people would be experts in their chosen field but not necessarily have the
skills in order to, yeah, like you say, figure out how to craft a CV or know what
kind of insurance to get. That’s right. And I guess one thing I didn’t mention was
that it culminates in the event. So the event is two weekends of exhibition and
practitioner demonstration in the Ballarat Mining Exchange, which is a beautiful
historic building. There are a series of alcoves that used to be the offices where
people back in the gold rush period would be buying shares in mines,
for example, or trading nuggets of gold for cash and things like that. So they’re
these very unusually shaped, very much an office -shaped room, if you like, that we
call the alcoves, and the practitioners each exist in one of those spaces for the
two weekends that we’re open. And people can pop in and see them.
that, I would say the majority of the practitioners are showing people how they do
what they do in that particular space. That’s kind of where it ends up for them.
The result of the program is being in the event, experiencing the training so that
they feel or that they have a confidence in their personal brand or their creative
voice and it gives them a little bit more of an understanding about their practice
and how that translates when someone says, what do you do? You know, for example,
it’s not always easy putting yourself out there, especially in the, it’s not a
market context, but it’s a market adjacent space because you’ve got people coming and
visiting and talking and demonstrating. So you do need to be able to feel confident
putting your best foot forward in that respect. And so your role in this is as a
curator. So you were involved in the in the application process and selecting who
was going to be one of those 18. That’s right. And then alongside of that,
so you’ve got those outcomes with the practitioners, then alongside of that, there’s
also part of the event and exhibition that is also something that you’ve worked on
curating. So can you tell us a little bit more about what that looks like and how
that ties into the space? Absolutely. So I think initially, maybe it was after the
first year or the second year, the management teams realised that the Mining Exchange
central space was basically empty. It was an opportunity to do something special
there. And over the years that has developed into an exhibition space,
and the criteria for being involved in the exhibition is a little more spread out.
And by that, I mean, you don’t have to be tied to the Ballarat LGA, you can also
be part of an adjacent LGA of which there are five that wrap around Ballarat since
we’re kind of landlocked in that in that regard. And that means that a practitioner
or a crafter can apply to participate in the exhibition. That’s a again curated
selected by me in this particular circumstance. We ended up this year,
it was the biggest it’s ever been and I take responsibility for that. I made a bit
of a rod for my own back by curating way too many pieces which I had, I think we
had 186 pieces that were shown and there were some that I couldn’t fit and didn’t
work in the space so there was still more that didn’t make it from 46 artists in
all of those surrounding areas and I did say no to some people primarily because
they were visual artists, as opposed to crafters, not because they weren’t good
enough or, you know, I didn’t like their work or anything like that. It was really
just more down to the criteria of the focus being craft. And the directive of the
assessment about craft is that it is something that has a history of use or a
media or a practice that has a history of creating a product of use seen in a
contemporary light or reimagined in a new way. And so visual art is a difficult one
to fit into that criteria. And even some of the craft is sometimes difficult to
identify whether or not that fits. But most of the time it is about the output
being a product that has a history in some form or another of being used.
If that makes sense. Yeah, it does. That’s interesting. Maybe there’s like a blurry
line. You mentioned textiles. The line is so blurry. There’s always a blurry line
with the creative arts and craft world. I mean, there was one visitor I heard
anecdotally who said, “If I’d have known this was an art show, I would have felt
differently.” And I think that’s where we’re still battling with the word craft.
We’re still battling with the word design. We’re still battling with the word art.
And what does that mean? And what do I expect from a show that uses the word
craft in it? Yeah. Well, especially since from like a brand positioning perspective,
craft lab from everything that I’ve seen. And I attended in 2023. Was it?
Yeah. 2023. You and I went together before you started working on it. you worked
for the first time as an assistant curator in 2024 and this year as the curator.
But my point being that in all of the experience that I have with Craft Lab as a
brand is that it’s quite elevated. Yeah, like very sophisticated. But then obviously
you and I have this history of craft through the design market world, which was
like almost like craft’s a dirty word. You’ve heard that before. So it’s interesting
how, yeah, like it’s now almost like flipped the art is the dirty word in this
context, even though I know it’s not. I know it’s not. I understand where you’re
coming from though. And yeah, we’re trying to sort of, I guess, reclaim craft as
the word that means craft’s person ship, as opposed to the stigma of it being a
nana crocheting. I guess we just need to reclaim the word and take it back again,
and Craft Lab is doing a very good job of that. – Yeah, definitely. So I want to
come back to talk more about the curation of the show and your involvement and what
that looks like. But there’s another element that I feel like needs some discussion
or acknowledgement at this point. And that is the very much centerpiece installation
that you commissioned Jenna, all day care to work on. Tell us more about that,
’cause I know in a lot of the photographs that’s something that is immediately what
catches the eye. – Yeah, again, over the, I mean, this is fifth year. So the
development of that central installation space or the exhibition space has slowly over
time become a bigger part of the event as well. And to take advantage of the space
and create something awe -inspiring was very much a goal this year.
The city of Ballarat, Tara Poole, who is the Creative City Coordinator and this is
her project. She has initiated this entire program and applied for a grant with
Festivals Australia, which was successful. We found out that it was successful in
February. Prior to that, we were planning the central installation for with or
without the grant. So we were kind of having these parallel plans of how this might
look if we do get the grant, how this might look if we don’t. And that went on
for sort of four or five months, knowing that it was possible that we could get
the grant and it was possible that we may not. So the design of the central
installation came about from, again, Tara’s idea that because Craft Lab exists inside
the Ballarat Heritage Festival, The idea was to ask the question,
“Whose heritage is it?” As in, “Who owns heritage? Where does it belong and who
does it actually belong to?” And within that question, it was very important for us
to highlight the First Nations people of Ballarat. So Ballarat exists on Waterung
Country and we felt that it was a very important thing when it comes to viewing
the heritage of the area to place First Nations history first. We wanted to create
an installation that meant the First Nations history was unavoidable in that space.
You would have to experience that first before you could experience any of the other
artworks in the exhibition, or indeed really even the practitioners and the
demonstrators. We wanted to highlight that. And because the theme of the entire
events, so each year Tara has kind of a one word theme, this year was intangible.
And early on in the curation process, I had determined a colour palette for the
event. And in that process as well, we usually have six tables or six themes and
I’ll tell you why and we’ll talk about that a little bit later because that’s also
another event that comes in as part of Craft Lab. So I chose six themes that fit
inside the concept of intangibility or that at least I felt they did and how that
relates to heritage. So I chose six themes and this is also,
It helps me to curate when I’ve got a structure, when I’ve got a system, when I’ve
created a little bit of a framework for myself. So I chose heart, healing,
history, story, spirit, and song as the six concepts that I felt represented in
tangibility and represented heritage. With that, the Deep Listening project,
once we realised that We did have the funding was handed to Amelia James to
coordinate. So Amelia was the head curator last year on Craft Lab.
And Jenna Oldaker, a Wadawurrung artist, a young custodian, was chosen to create six
artworks in relation to those themes using that color palette. And the idea was for
Jenna to speak to First Nations elders and get their stories. So Jenna spoke with
six local First Nations elders and to talk to them about their lives and their
stories and then interpret those into artworks, which were then translated, digitized,
turned into gigantic banners that were placed on the outside of these circular rooms
that we’d created with curtains. And in each of those rooms was a round table and
on that round table was where the exhibition existed. Thereby trying to sort of
achieve that sense of having to go through a First Nations cultural experience before
considering anyone else’s the whole concept of the installation. We weren’t sure which
way we were going and once, yeah, we only found out in February that the grant was
successful, thankfully. – I didn’t actually realize that you had those six themes
within the larger theme of the show. Yeah, I guess I just always assumed that that
was something that Jenna had come up with as part of the concept or that that was
just, I don’t know, I think I just realizing that that had kind of already been
laid out. And like you say, you’d created that framework and that Jenna was able to
come in and still work within that, I think was really awesome because obviously the
work that she created is just absolutely awe -inspiring and the colors are so
beautiful and without even seeing them in real life, I had such a huge sense of
the scale and how they would make you feel to be standing under them and within
them. I think it was, yeah, it’s really beautiful that that all tied together in
that way. But yeah, I think that you did a really awesome job to be able to have
that kind of plan B, plan A and have the two different paths, but when you did
come to the final conclusion or the final piece that it did still feel cohesive and
like it was always meant to be there, I guess is what I’m trying to say. Yeah, I
mean, there was a lot that I had to go into. Amelia was responsible for the deep
listening project and that larger installation, that’s not always part of craft lab.
We do have an installation of some description where we often commissioned someone to
create something in the center. But this was kind of a bit of above and beyond in
that sense, you know, because we did have that funding, that additional funding from
the federal government. It allowed us to capitalize on the cathedral -like,
I guess, structure of that actual building because it is quite tall internally. And
so with the past experience of the year before, we had banners. A local Japanese
artist Seiko Hoashi had used her calligraphy art work on these gigantic banners.
So she’d used these gigantic calligraphy paintbrushes and made it on the actual
banners. So they were actually original artworks that were hanging. But we learned
from that the space really benefited from something high that hung in that space.
And so we sort of extrapolated on that with the rooms, if you like. We had to
have aluminium rings especially made that would hang from the struts in the ceiling.
We had curtains specifically made to specific measurements and so on. And then of
course the banners needed to be printed separately and they hung on the outside. And
there were two banners per room. And The idea of having the two banners was one
was representing the story, the person, and the other one was representing the untold
stories. So the First Nations stories that we never get to hear or that have never
been told of which there are many. Every single choice that was made in that
installation was very purposeful and very much about creating a meaningful
installation. You’ve kind of hinted at talking about everything being really specific
and purpose built because like you mentioned before one thing We haven’t talked about
at all is the great takeaway We is a standalone event that sits within is it part
of craft lab? It is part of not craft lab in that it’s its own But one I guess
the interesting thing and hearing it from your perspective as the person who designed
it And this is what what I guess I meant by your curation role isn’t just picking
artwork off a list. It really was pulling together the practitioners in the alcoves,
the exhibition, the deep listening project and then this fourth element, the great
takeaway and making sure that all of this could operate and function within the
mining exchange space over the course of the two weekends that you had there without
it feeling like A puzzle piece that didn’t quite fit together and I think with the
great takeaway being an event that a dining event that required tables for people to
sit at being able to design the exhibition to sort of serve that purpose. Yeah, I
mean tell us about how that fits in or before you do tell us is that going to be
its own bonus episode. It was about so with every choice that you make in terms of
tables or in terms of the structure of the space, you not only need to consider,
as you said, the exhibition, but the fact that there is going to be a dining
experience happening in that central exhibition space as well.
So in between the two weekends on the Thursday night, 60 diners come in. And this
is where those themes had to be chosen quite early on, because what we do is
commission six different ceramicists to create 10 dinner plates and side plates.
We commission a glass artist to create 60 wine glasses and 60 water glasses and we
commission a textile artist to create 60 napkins and those items are then placed
within the exhibition. Now when I say within the exhibition I mean in that central
space and I’ll explain why I don’t meet in the exhibition. In any case, the Great
Takeaway had to commission those ceramicists quite early on in the project because it
takes quite a long time to create all of those things. That’s where the palette
that I’d chosen had come into it and the themes that I’d chosen had come into it
because I needed to begin that commissioning process and so again once you’ve chosen
that theme and those colours, it does allow you to more easily navigate all of the
other things that have to come with it. And so each of the tables had a colour
theme and each of the tables had a theme overall. I did not design the plinth
structure of the exhibit, which again that might have to come in another episode.
What I learned doing that because I did have to take the entire exhibition down and
the same as I did last year. I have to take it all down for the dining event and
then put it all back up again on the Friday before everybody comes back again on
the Saturday. We’re going to do a couple of bonus episodes. We’ve kind of covered
the practitioner element and the deep listening project. I think we’d do another
bonus episode where we talk about the rest of the exhibition. But I think that’s at
least another one bonus episode, if not two. Thank you for sharing or I am keen to
hear more, like I said, it’s something that I’ve just been watching from afar in
all, but just like so impressed. And I feel like a fan girl getting the chance to
chat to you about it so intimately. So that’s cool. – Oh, that’s nice. – I’m looking
forward to round two when we chat next. – Excellent. – Yeah, hope you are too.

Thank you very much. We will you talking about Craft Lab in our next bonus
episode. Thanks for joining us. And for those of you who are wanting to know when
our next season is coming out, it is very soon, I promise. And yeah,
season two is already being planned, so stay tuned. It’s on the way. We’ll talk to
you soon.
Thanks for listening to Make Good Things Happen. If you enjoyed this episode, why
not write a review? Or share it with a friend. For show notes and more, head to
mgth .com .au. This has been a D’Alton Baker Production.

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