Unit 3: Crafts, essential part of a culture.

What would the world’s greatest cultures would have been without crafts? I think that the answer is almost unbearable. There would never have been great cultures and consequently, contemporary cultures would not exist neither. The fact is that crafts are the medium in which cultures represent their unique characteristics. The artistic use of wood, ceramics, glass, metalwork and fiber, among other simple materials, have taken an immense impact in the definition of art in general. Examples of the use of the previous mentioned materials are the wood figures made by the Native Americans, the blown glass figures by the Aztecs, and the metalwork jewelry made by the Hindi. When defining crafts, it can be said that they are those artistic things that make a place or a person be connected with tendencies, traditions and cultures with some sort of extravaganza and authenticity. For today’s world the word “crafts” means either activities as painting ceramics or artisan work. Most people does not know that the term  “crafts” has a much broader definition and includes numerous activities. The truth is that although  “crafts” was more a fashion tendency during the nineteenth century, its meaning should always be associated with hand-made objects that reflect the unique characteristics of a culture.