ABSTRACT
A perceptive category is a subjective, adjustable category through which we can set thresholds with regards to the categorisation and analyses of data, based on the human sensory modalities and the limitations thereof. The emphasis of an analysis through perceptive categories is on those characteristics of the data that are recognisable with the senses and the tools used by craftspeople at a certain time. The limits of sensory modalities provide the limits of the psychophysical framework and together with the constraints of material physics, this makes it possible to study the relationship between them within certain limitations. Craft is a constant interplay between man and material and the chaine operatoire in its form is unable to show the different responses that are the result of this interplay, and at the heart of skilful handling of a material. The chaine operatoire has been criticised for being a step-by-step analysis that is too 'mechanical' to analyse craft.
