UGH.
I have a few thoughts, perhaps unsurprisingly. My first is that this is a formalization of something and that has some very real, very upsetting consequences (to myself and my profession, anyway. I am pretty sure it doesn't affect a lot of other people and that just makes it sadder...) it also might have a good side.
The cons are more obvious. I know that every time I mentioned in class that "painting is dead (or dying)" the students (especially the painting students, duh!) jumped down my throat. Of course they did--its not like they had lost the urge to paint. The impetus and inspiration to paint their hearts out was alive and well and I would imagine will be alive and well until we mutate into another species. In other words, the need to create images, including immobile two dimensional images, is part of our genetic make up. Whether these need to be in oil paint remains to be seen. I kinda doubt it, but I always hated the smell of oil paint and how it ruined all my clothes! Regardless, no one wants their medium to be publicly declared "irrelevant".
Back to the cons. Declaring something deceased is troublesome if you find it viable and are passionate about practicing it. The article by the BSMGP (I am a member, fyi) cites the following consequences: Loss of skills, loss of practitioners, decline in education, lack of training and employment ops, loss of materials (so true!!! I am having a harder and harder time sourcing things) and loss of relevance.
UGH. This is very sad indeed.
The death of stained glass "quaintifies" it. I work in stained glass and I feel like half my battle is convincing people I don't make my pieces in historic costume in a reconstructed colonial village. By the way, I don't think there was stained glass in colonial America, so there's that. We don't have an reconstructed medieval villages in the US as far as I know. ANYWAY, stained glass, IMHO, has been dying for a long time. So long that the corpse has stopped smelling. In other words, I am in a good position to speak on the PROS of working in a deceased medium.
Pro #1: Stained glass is dead, long live stained glass! Stained glass is not a person but a medium and a tradition. It actually can't die. People still respond strongly to images created with radiant colored light. As far as I can tell, this is a biological response and will not change. Similar to what I said above about the impetus and inspiration to paint, so to, is there an impetus to "craft" as well as reasons why there will always be an audience. Can you say "empathy"?)
People will continue to appreciate stained glass when they see it. Because of this, it would be most helpful if the pieces they are looking at don't suck. But, regardless, the power of radiant light is such a compelling effect that it almost doesn't matter. This has been the strength and weakness of stained glass since forever and contributes to its ongoing death AND its ongoing life!
Something the BSMGP may not have noticed is that stained glass enjoyed a revival during Covid. One of its superpowers as a medium is that is is very DIY. This will help it survive. This will also ensure that there are many untutored practitioners. Again, this is for better and worse.
Pro #2: I can't think of one. Uh oh...
My final comments will be on the idea of "progress" in the arts. We want to tie progress to technology, and for good reason. Technology definitely progresses! But does art? I think not. As Picasso allegedly pointed out when visiting the caves of Altamira “In 15,000 years we have invented nothing!”
For this reason, I think its kind of hubris-y to assumed that the latest technology somehow represents a paradigm shift for art. We are still tied to a biological imperative to understand the world via senses and image. Whether these images can wash and fold your laundry and do the cha-cha (think AI) is irrelevant--there is still "magic" and meaning to be found in images which sit there and do nothing but assert themselves as images, damitol! The burden is on the beholder to find the enchantment, after all, you still have the brain of neolithic humans, so what's stopping you?
Long live stained glass!
Part of this post inspired by this book (which I have only read chapter one as of this writing)
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