Craft labour and creative industries

This article examines the role and status of craft labour in the creative industries. While it tends to be overlooked, craft labour is an integral part of what is ostensibly an artist-led and 'creative' work process. The article highlights the necessity of craft in the creative industry 'workshop', and the relative autonomy enjoyed by its practitioners. However, while craft labour is depicted as vital, it is also subordinate to artistic labour, and amenable to reform through rational management and refinement of the division of labour - thus a series of likely threats to future craft production are outlined. The article concludes by appealing for further scrutiny of the conditions of craft labour in creative work, not only to reveal its particular and specific qualities, but to extend the somewhat limited scope of contemporary analyses of cultural and creative industry labour and politics.