Arts and Craft

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Arts & Crafts Movement

"The true secret of happiness lies in taking a genuine interest in all the details of daily life." - William Morris

The Arts and Crafts Movement revived traditional artistic craftsmanship with themes of simplicity, honesty, function, harmony, nature and social reform. The movement promoted moral and social health through quality of architecture and design executed by skilled creative workers, and was a revolt against the poor quality of industrialized mass production.

Strawberry Thief (1883)

Figure 1: Strawberry Thief (1883) Indigo-discharged and block-printed cotton - Victoria and Albert Museum, London. The Art Story

William Morris is known for his beautiful and intricate, textile designs, that made a mark in the history of design.

Strawberry Thief (1883) is one of William Morris’s best-known textile designs, on which he worked for several months to perfect the craft of printing on fabric. The pattern was based on his daily life, based on birds (thrushes) that would steal strawberries from his kitchen. Morris wants to tell a story in each of his works, where the viewer will hear the birds sing and how the artwork would come to life when viewed. This medieval style of decoration which the art is based on would be used to decorate curtains or as wallpaper.

Morris took craftsmanship very serious of physically creating art with human labor, making each artwork individual, and perfectly crafted every time. In order to create this unique artwork William Morris learned the theory of fabric-dyeing and block-printing. His main purpose was to authenticate the creative process and design the right dept of color in his finished artwork.

Although his designs have little dept with the fore- and background, the focus point is still achieved with the right colors and the naturalistic aspects of the design. The ancient block-printing technique discharges indigo, that was applied by bleached blocks to dye the fabric. Although it was costly and laborious, this design has attained a major success in the late nineteenth century, and continues to sell. Contemporary artists still use these beautiful, intricate artworks as inspiration to celebrate the mass influence that William Morris has on the design industry. (Figure1)

Modern Example: Jeremy Deller (Love is Enough)

Jeremy Deller: Based on William Morris - Strawberry Thief. Bromo Blue, Ruby Red & Emerald Green neon mounted to a stove enamel box.

Love is Enough draws together iconic and rarely seen works by two giants of the 19th and 20th centuries. This unconventional combination of artists’ work is curated by Jeremy Deller who cites Morris and Warhol as his two greatest artistic influences. (Figure 2)