Deciphering the Craft of the Laser Cutter.
Handmade and Digital Crafts in Collaboration- A development of a craft methodology for future technologies.
Undergraduate Dissertation.
Published and presented at EKSIG: Estonian Academy of Arts Conference on Experiential Knowledge and Collaboration. Estonia, Tallinn, 2019.
Awarded the Foster Prize for Highest Graded Dissertation at the Design School Leeds University.
In Collaboration with Jane Scott: The University of Leeds.
This research investigates how the experiential knowledge of a maker can be transformed through collaboration with laser technology. The research is situated within craft theory, evaluating the new tool developed through the research against the craft attributes of the hand-made, skill, risk and technology. Practice led experimental research developed a new digital drawing tool, recording the path of the laser cutter using a range of different drawing pens to yield a variety of different crafted marks. All areas of the results show a hybridisation of craft techniques and knowledge of technology, to achieve a collaborative approach to making. The significance of the research is that it demonstrates how collaborations between the handmade and digital can introduce craft thinking into digital workflows, creating a digital craft methodology which can be applied to further technologies in the future.
