Let's begin with a disclaimer. I am nuts about baskets. Whether they come from the Aleutians or the Southwest, if they are plaited in the American South or woven in New Guinea or Sub-Saharan Africa, baskets turn me on.
It wasn't until I moved to Seattle, however, that I got beyond ethnic baskets and became aware of the extraordinary work done by contemporary American basket artists, especially those in the Northwest. So it is to be expected that I have a special affection for the current show at Fountainhead Gallery.
"Natural origins - Contemporary Baskets" features work by seven master basket makers. All are nationally recognized for their innovative approaches to an art form that has evolved from the centuries-old, rather mundane task of creating a household container. Their work provides the opportunity to see this art in all its diversity.
Because our prehistoric ancestors used perishable materials to make their baskets, it's hard to say exactly when they first wove or knotted containers to carry their goods from one hunting or gathering site to another. Archaeological evidence indicates they had figured it out at least 10,000 to 12,000 years ago.
Through the years, wherever people were, there were baskets. Light in weight and practical, they made excellent storage or carrying containers, and until recent years that's what they were: household objects made from the natural resources of the region, often beautiful, but basically functional.
Today's basket artists honor their heritage but explore new dimensions. Their baskets are art not necessarily utilitarian. And instead of restricting themselves to the vegetal fibers of their region, these artists work with everything from buttons and credit cards to fish skin and nuts and bolts.
Today's basket makers are restricted only by their imagination. There is no material they can't use. There is no form they must follow. Their work occupies a place somewhere between container and sculpture.
Of the seven artists with baskets on display at Fountainhead, five are from the Northwest, and one, Dona Anderson, makes her home in Queen Anne. Although she's worked with a variety of materials in the past, she currently creates her baskets from reeds wrapped in paper and then painted. Her pieces are the most sculptural, the least traditional in the show.
Recently she completed an "armor" series inspired by current concerns about the body protection provided our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. These containers for the human body evolved from the research she did on forms of armor that have been used in other societies and in other times. Painted in grays and blacks, and evoking ancient Japanese and medieval designs, they meld power with beauty.
Jan Hopkins, who lives in Mukilteo, has another sort of body container in the show. Hers is a corset made predominantly out of bull kelp. Kelp is brown on the outside with a creamy inside. Hopkins' corset, which is obviously sized for a beautifully proportioned woman, makes good use of both colors. In other of her pieces she uses citrus peel, lotus and other seed pods, agave leaves and cedar bark. She carefully prepares her materials, then meticulously integrates them into containers that reveal the secrets of their construction only after careful examination.
Polly Adams Sutton from South Seattle works with many of the natural fibers that were used by the Indians of this region, and her containers are influenced by the native basket makers with whom she studied. Her pieces, however, take flight from her own imagination. Their free form reflects both the natural curve of the bark strips from which they are made as well as her own aesthetic sense.
Marilyn Moore, who first made baskets with pine needles, now works with colored copper wire, the sort used in electromagnetic motors. This Burien artist wraps the strands of color around a copper base and then weaves them together, gradually introducing complementary shades to create small containers that appear to be shimmering, three-dimensional minimalist paintings.
There are airy, gossamer baskets by Tacoma artist Jill Nordfors Clark. She was an embroiderer before she became a basket maker, and her baskets reflect that background. With needle lace stitching, she uses gut to connect the various twigs and other natural materials that make up her open-work baskets.
Two of the artists live far from the shores of Puget Sound. They offer still other definitions of the basket.
Mary Merkel-Hess captures the wind-tossed fields of grain and corn of her native Iowa in her brilliantly painted baskets whose reeds rise above the base in shapes to mirror that of her landscape. Elizabeth Whyte Schulze, a Massachusetts artist, creates far more traditional coiled baskets. What makes her work unique are the layers of paint applied to the surface in designs that appear primitive and prehistoric.
Seven artists, all creating baskets, all doing so in unique fashion. Their work reveals the enormous diversity of materials as well as the mind boggling range of shapes that make up contemporary baskets.
If you're already a fan of this artform, you will definitely want to visit Fountainhead this month. If the word basket brings to your mind a wicker picnic hamper and little more, then you owe it to yourself to broaden your perspective.
'Natural Origins - Contemporary Baskets' runs through July 30 at Fountainhead Gallery, located at 625 W. McGraw St. is open afternoons Thursdays through Sundays. Or call 285-4467.
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