Craft in America

Throughout time, craft work has been a community activity. Gifted artists and passionate newcomers alike reveal the deeply held belief that craft is about more than just the making of an object. Featured artists include Jamex & Einar de la Torre, Preston Singletary, Pilchuck Glass School, Sarah Jaeger, Ken Loeber, Dona Look, Mississippi Cultural Crossroads, Penland School, Denise & Sam Wallace.

Craft artists depend on their natural environment for both materials and inspiration. This hour looks at the processes through which natural materials become finished works of craft, and what deeper messages may be contained therein. Featured artists include Jan Yager, Kit Carson, David Gurney, George & Mira Nakashima, Richard Notkin, and Timberline Lodge.

Take a tour through craft's history in America beginning with the pioneers of the field to the intimate stories of some of our country's most prominent craft artists. Memory observes how past is prologue, and looks to the dynamic of cultural history and personal heritage in creating objects. Featured artists include Sam Maloof, Garry Knox Bennett, Mary Jackson, Tom Joyce, and Pat Courtney Gold.

What inspires a person to choose a career in craft? How does one acquire the knowledge and necessary skills? From self-taught artists to those who pursue formal study, from avocation to college, from apprenticeships to craft schools. Featured artists include the 92nd St Y, Dave & Roberta Williamson, Cary Esser, Nikki Lewis, KCAI, N. Bennet St. School, Tom Killion, and Julie Chen.

The American craft tradition did not just appear, fully-formed and mature. The artists in Origins tie their work to early craft techniques and demonstrate how they are involved in passing these techniques to others in a continuum of creativity. Featured artists include Philip Simmons, Mark Hewitt, Teri Greeves, Jim Bassler, Paul Stankard, and Vernon, Pam, and Travis Owens.

Family explores the creative environments and personal dynamics of four families of craft artists and asks: Is talent inherited? What is it like to live in a household where objects are made by hand? Meet the featured artists (the Lees, Marionis, Moulthrops and Sorrells).

Many artists use their craft to share personal and political opinions. Craft has the ability to entice viewers to consider topics that they might find difficult. By expressing their ideas through their work, artists add meaning to the objects they create. Featured artists include glass artist Beth Lipman, santero Charles M. Carrillo, bead artist Joyce J. Scott; and jeweler & sculptor Thomas Mann.

How do borders and personal crossroads affect an artist? How do science and craft interact? How do other cultures influence American style and technique? This episode explores the intersections of craft, culture, and technology. Featured artists include Tanya Aguiñiga, Lia Cook, Clary Illian, Warren MacKenzie, and Jeff Oestreich.

Explore the creativity of the human spirit through works that begin with the humble thread. Featured artists include fiber artist Terese Agnew, weaver Randall Darwall & designer Brian Murphy, artist Faith Ringgold, and fiber artist Consuelo Jimenez Underwood.

Industry explores the business of craft and how artists contribute to local and national economies.

Embracing familiar and new winter celebrations of our American experience with the handmade. Celebrates some of our most important cultural and religious customs and leads viewers directly to their own creativity.

Exceptional artists forging metal magically transformed by fire. Follow Chloe Darke as she begins her career as a silversmith at Old Newbury Crafters; Iraqi war veterans Tom Pullin and Jeremiah Holland as they turn to art as an antidote to the harsh realities of war; Join sculptor Albert Paley as he prepares for Paley on Park Avenue, the most ambitious project of his 50 year career.

Documenting craft in the military and the power of the handmade to inspire and heal.

Discover the role craft plays in our winter holiday traditions, rituals, and festivities. Featuring lion dancers & float builders for San Francisco’s Chinese New Year Parade, ceramic artists in Michigan for the holidays at Pewabic (Detroit) and Motawi Tileworks (Ann Arbor), Kwanzaa celebrations with Chicago & Oakland artists, and Christmas card making in Tacoma with Yoshiko Yamamoto.

A look at how fine handmade instruments are crafted, featuring the world renowned artists who play them including Jake Shimabukuro with his Kamaka ukulele, Joan Baez with her Martin guitar, Scotty Barnhart of the Count Basie Orchestra with his David Monette trumpet, Rhiannon Giddens with her James Hartel banjo, Tony Ellis with his Stelling Banjo, timpanist Joseph Pereira and mallet maker Jason Ginter.

Artists explore the beauty and wonder of the natural world. Featuring sculptor Patrick Dougherty, artist Mary Merkel-Hess, woodcarver Michelle Holzapfel, glass artist Preston Singletary, book artist Catherine Alice Michaelis.

Artists committed to sharing their skills and passion for craft with students of all ages. Featuring Navajo weavers Barbara Teller Ornelas and Lynda Teller Pete at Idyllwild Arts, glass artist Mark Mitsuda at Punahou School, glass artist Therman Statom, and ceramic artist Linda Sikora at Alfred University School of Art and Design.

Explore the connections between Mexico and the United States through craft. Featuring ceramic artist Gerardo Monterrubio; ceramic artists Magdalena Pedro Martínez and Carlomagno Pedro Martínez; glass artist Jaime Guerrero; silver designers William Spratling, Carmen Tapia, Miguel Angel Ortíz Miranda, Cristina Romo, and Eduardo Herrera; muralist Judy Baca and SPARC.

Explore the connections between Mexico and the United States through craft. Featuring master altar maker Ofelia Esparza and the Day of the Dead celebration; master weaver J. Isaac Vásquez Garcia and family; weaver Jim Bassler, potter Veralee Bassler and the colorful Guelaguetza parade; and artist Kiff Slemmons and maestro Francisco Toledo at Taller Arte Papel.

Documenting the ways in which artists and influencers inspire new generations to envision the limitless possibilities of craft. Featuring textile designer and founder of LongHouse Reserve Jack Lenor Larsen, curator Helen Molesworth and Black Mountain College, fiber artist Kay Sekimachi, collector Forrest L. Merrill, and book artist Felicia Rice.

Explore the diverse craft traditions and innovations in the Golden State. Featuring Pomo basket weaver Corine Pearce, silversmith Randy Stromsoe, the Arts and Crafts architecture of Greene and Greene, stained glass artists at Judson Studios, cabinetmakers James Ipekjian and Jack Ipekjian, and textile artist Deborah Cross.

Artists explore issues of gender, race, culture and place, offering true expressions of their experiences in this world. Featuring potter Diego Romero, photographer Cara Romero, furniture maker Wendy Maruyama and sculptor Cristina Cordova.

Learn about contemporary quilters as we celebrate the role quilts have played in our country's story. Featuring Susan Hudson, Victoria Findlay Wolfe, Michael A. Cummings, Judith Content, the International Quilt Museum and special guest Ken Burns.

In the galleries and halls of our treasured institutions; in the hands of Native American, African American, and Veteran artists; from Appalachia to the Rio Grande Valley; Democracy explores how craft is intertwined with our nation’s defining principles. Hear from Robert L. Lynch, President of Americans for the Arts, who speaks to the role of government in the arts.

Meet artists who use narrative to communicate personal and universal truths. Featuring artist Nicholas Galanin, Julie Schafler Dale, Linda J. Mendelson, George Rodriguez and Christina Bothwell.

Explore the history, artistry, and impact of personal adornment. Featuring: classic jeweler Tom Herman; Harriete Estel Berman who creates jewelry with recycled materials; the coeditors of Ornament Magazine; the legacy of modernist jeweler Art Smith; nature-inspired artist Gabrielle Gould; and Navajo/Hopi master jeweler Jesse Monongya.

Bridging the art forms of music and craft, and celebrating the joy of music and the creation of handcrafted instruments. Featuring accordion maker Marc Savoy and the Savoy family, bow maker Susan Lipkins, luthier Doug Naselroad and the Appalachian Artisan Center Culture of Recovery Program, and artist Richard Jolley, whose monumental sculpture inspired a violin concerto.

COLLECTORS reveals the essential role that craft appreciators play in the community, examining how collectors affirm and inspire the artists they support. The episode highlights collections from Chicano art to teapots to wooden spoons, looking at what drives collectors and how their support furthers artists at all stages of their careers.

SCIENCE investigates the unexpected intersection between art and the sciences, spanning technology, engineering, biology, math, and the climate emergency. Nature, space, algorithms, and more serve as inspiration for artists connecting their work to the world around them, from the Santa Clara Pueblo in New Mexico to the computer science labs of MIT to NASA.

WEST celebrates the continuum of heritage and the handmade, taking inspiration from the landscape, history and culture of the American West. Working across cowboy arts, Hawaiian indigenous practices, and Native American handwork, the artists show how traditional craft can be revived, reworked and reinvented in the art of today.

EAST explores the intersection of history, culture and contemporary craft in the eastern region of the US. As a nation of immigrants, these American stories, from a fabric flower factory to a silversmith to a potter and more, highlight the diverse expressions behind modern craft.