Are Crafters Edgy?

This is a question I'm coming back to a lot these days. To rephrase, or clarify a little bit, what I'm pondering is how I'm changing as an artist now that I'm settling down in Asheville. I got my BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago a little more than three years ago. I spent a while making drawings in my bedroom and sending out pieces of mailable art when I first moved to North Carolina after graduating, but I really felt like I hit a sustainable stride when I started making books, or, as I now think of them, Crafts.

So I've moved from Art making to Craft making, and it feels pretty great. And it's surprising. My printmaking teacher once angrily lectured our class that if we needed extra money, we should get a part time job, because he sure as hell didn't want to see us spending our time making prints to sell in the school's yearly holiday art sale. At that point, I saw no prospect of making money on making things unless I sold out bigtime.

But now I don't feel like a sellout, even though most of what I make these days has a retail destination of some sort. I don't feel edgy, but I still feel like an artist. Most of the time I feel like a creative person who makes beautiful things that lots of people happen to like looking at. That's not too bad, is it?