The Art of Native American Basketry: A Living Tradition
Autry National Center to Present the Major Exhibition.
On View November 6, 2009, through May 30, 2010.
The First Comprehensive Exhibition of Autry’s Premier Collection of Native American Baskets from the Southwest Museum.
The world’s largest—and among its most important—collection of Native American baskets, representing eleven regions and more than 100 cultural groups, will be revealed to the public for the first time when the Autry National Center presents The Art of Native American Basketry: A Living Tradition, a comprehensive exhibition that opens November 6, 2009, and runs through May 30, 2010.
More than 250 objects will be on view, ranging in size from small Pomo feather baskets made for sale to tourists, to massive Apache olla baskets used for storing large quantities of seeds. Because the works shown have been selected from a remarkably wide-ranging and distinguished collection, visitors will be able to see how the materials, techniques, and designs of the baskets vary from region to region, reflecting different physical environments and traditions. Also evident will be the distinctive styles of individual artists, whose signatures can be instantly recognizable to other weavers. The Autry has invited thirteen contemporary basketweavers to serve as consultants in research and planning and will purchase a basket from each consultant to add to the permanent collection.
The Art of Native American Basketry is drawn from the nearly 14,000 baskets in the collection of the Southwest Museum of the American Indian, considered to be one of the premier holdings of its kind in the world. The exhibition will be presented at the Autry’s Museum of the American West in Griffith Park. Both institutions are part of the Autry National Center, an intercultural organization dedicated to expanding our understanding of the diverse peoples of the American West.
“Basketry is one of the most important traditions of Native American peoples, and therefore of the nation as a whole,” said John Gray, President and CEO of the Autry National Center. “We are proud that the Autry can use its great collection to provide the public with such a complete and compelling overview of this tradition, thanks to careful conservation efforts and the expertise of our curators and our consultants.”
“The Southwest Museum’s unparalleled collection reflects the great cultural and artistic diversity of the Native peoples of North America,” said Steven M. Karr, lead curator of the exhibition and Interim Executive Director of the Southwest Museum. “This rich display of historic and contemporary baskets, combined with multimedia elements, tells the story of a living art tradition through the voices of the weavers themselves.”
Although the Southwest Museum’s holdings date back over a century, many of the baskets in its collection were contemporary works made by living artists at the time they were acquired. The works on view in The Art of Native American Basketry vary in date from a mid-nineteenth-century Huron birch bark basket decorated with porcupine quills and moose hair, to baskets made just this year by the exhibition’s consultants. Native American basketry’s many functions will be represented, from domestic uses such as cooking or gathering, to symbolic or ritual purposes such as gift-giving and ceremonial observance, to the commercial function of being sold in the marketplace to non-Indian buyers. A full range of geographic regions will also be represented, including the Northeast, Southeast, Great Plains, Arctic and Subarctic, Great Basin, Northwest Coast, Plateau, Southwest, Northern California, Central California, and Southern California.
“It’s great to have a show like this that includes basketry from all over North America and to educate people about the different materials baskets are made from,” said Kelly Church (Ojibwe/Ottawa), one of the exhibition’s consultants. “It’s also important that people understand that these are sustained traditions, but that because of changing environmental conditions, there are fewer materials available today from which to make baskets.”
Visitors will enter the exhibition through a dramatic visible storage area allowing for the display of a broad range of baskets. The main interpretive section is organized by geographic region.
Each section will include significant examples of baskets from that region, video footage of contemporary basketweavers, and other interpretive elements such as basket-making materials and audio components providing descriptions from Native consultants. To provide further cultural and historical context, the gallery will include historic photographs from the Institute for the Study of the American West’s Braun Research Library.
Exhibition highlights include a lidded basket made by renowned Wiyot weaver Elizabeth Hickox, Inupiaq whale baleen baskets topped with ivory carvings, and a vintage Chitimacha alligator motif basket made of river cane.
Because baskets are complex and often delicate objects, conservators have been working to restore, preserve, and catalog the Southwest Museum’s vast collection for the past six years. Their efforts, including such techniques as freezing baskets for pest mitigation, have been crucial in the creation of The Art of Native American Basketry.
The consultants for The Art of Native American Basketry are:
- Ruby Chimerica (Hopi)
- Kelly Church (Ojibwe/Ottawa)
- Sue Coleman (Washo)
- Roberta Conner (Umatilla)
- John Darden (Chitimacha)
- Mary Jane Dudley (San Carlos Apache)
- Carol Emarthle-Douglas (Northern Arapaho/Seminole)
- Sue Hill (Cahuilla)
- Deborah McConnell (Hupa/Yurok/Quinault)
- June Pardue (Alutiiq/Inupiaq)
- Lucy Parker (Pomo/Miwok/Paiute)
- Theresa Secord (Penobscot)
- Lisa Telford (Haida)
The Art of Native American Basketry: A Living Tradition is made possible by the generosity of the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians, Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation, and the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences.
For more information, visit www.AutryNationalCenter.org.
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