AFA Summer 2019

Summer 88 www.afamag.com | w ww.incollect.com by Jo Stealey and Kristin Schwain ROOTED REVIVED REINVENTED H istorically, baskets were rooted in local landscapes and shaped by cultural traditions (Fig. 1). They served utilitarian functions and played pivotal roles in stimulating identity and forging community (Fig. 2). The rise of the Industrial Revolution at the end of the nineteenth century led basket makers to create works for new audiences and markets, including tourists, collectors, and fine art museums (Fig. 3). While retaining the forms, iconographies, and processes central to their tradition, basket makers also responded to the regional availability of materials, cultural exchange, and market forces. The “New Basketry,” an American art movement named by one of its founders, artist Ed Rossbach, emerged on the scene in the 1960s during an explosion of interest in all craft media (Fig. 4). Rossbach’s generous spirit inspired students and colleagues, who made California a hotbed of innovation that spread across the entire United States. These artists were influenced by a confluence of factors, including global weaving traditions, the back-to-the-landers’ creation of hand-made products, the feminist movement’s celebration of traditional crafts as art (Fig. 5), and experimentation with architecturally scaled textiles. Today, there are three dominant strains in the contemporary basketry movement. Some artists perpetuate and transform the historical traditions in which they work. Responding to the growth of the art market, the loss of conventional materials caused by environmental devastation, and socio-economic issues facing their communities, these artists maintain basketry as living traditions (Figs. 6a, 6b). Other artists, inspired by the energy generated by the New Basketry, explore baskets as sculptural forms and experiment with new production methods and materials (Fig. 7 ). Their investigations, also motivated by modernism’s emphasis on the medium as the primary carrier of meaning, produce a visual language that interrogates American history and culture (Figs. 8, 9). A third group of artists bridge the gap between the craft origins of basket making and the medium’s new place within sculpture, textile, and installation art. By exploring scale and dynamic form, these artists explore a wide variety of ideas and issues, including the visualization of scientific data, cultural appropriation and environmental politics. Additionally, they address the nature of art itself; how form and materials can be the subject of art as well as its meaning; and how art navigates between and among utility, commodity, and the aestheticized object in the fine art world (Fig. 10). BASKETRY IN AMERICA