Threading Inwards, Reading Outwards: the Politics of Care in Contemporary Craft Curatorial Practice

The discourse of "care" has become a dominant rhetorical framework in contemporary craft curation, yet its ubiquity raises a critical question: at what depth does "care" operate as a genuine ethical intervention, rather than a consumable curatorial gesture? This presentation takes "Threading Inwards," a group textile exhibition held at The Mills, Hong Kong in March 2026, as a core case study to examine the internal tensions produced when "care" discourse lands in actual craft curatorial practice. The analysis moves through four critical paths: craft as epistemology; the labour and power structures of socially engaged practice; the limits of repair; and the politics of geopolitical framing. Drawing on the works of fourteen artists from across Asia, the paper argues that "care" discourse in craft curation is not simply a question of curatorial sincerity or intention, but of discursive structure. The analysis reveals how "care" simultaneously enables critical depth and risks flattening geopolitical difference, beautifying irreversible harm, and absorbing participatory labour into institutional ethical capital. The conclusion suggests that the most productive form of "care" discourse lies not in resolving these tensions through soft and gentle gesture, but in holding them. By sustaining the unstable potential of rupture within the framework of connection, "care" may be transformed from emotional rhetoric into a genuinely political apparatus, one that opens sustained inquiry and allows different possibilities to unfold over time.