Detroit society of arts and crafts

DEFINITION

Influenced by the late 19th Century Arts and Crafts begun in England, which was a reaction against mass production, this entity was patterned after the Arts and Crafts Society in Boston. The DSAC was founded in 1906 with George Booth, managing editor of the "Detroit News". as President. In 1916, the Society became the first Arts and Crafts organization in America to construct its own building, located at 47 Watson Street. In 1926, the Society had a school, The Society of Arts and Crafts School of Art, now the Center for Creative Studies. In 1929, work by Alexander Calder was introduced by the Society in Detroit, as well as other modernist American artists. By the early 21st Century, the Society was not functioning, but the School remains. The Society's legacy is that it thrived as a counter influence in Detroit at the time the city became the world's leading center of industrial production, and it also melded aspects of industry into aesthetics. A defining moment had been the Society's introduction of the automobile as an art form. The Ford family subsequently gave much money to the School, which expanded into a four year college with a degree given in industrial design. Source: Internet: detroit1701.org/Det Society of Arts and Crafts.html; apps.detnews.com/apps/history/index.php?id=75