A Measure of the Earth: The Cole-Ware Collection of American Baskets

Abstract

A Measure of the Earth: The Cole-Ware Collection of American Baskets. By Nicholas R. Bell with foreword by Henry Glassie. (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian American Art Museum, Renwick Gallery, 2013. Pp. 192, foreword, preface, essay, plates, checklist, further reading, artist index, photo credits. $50.00 hardbound.)Based on the gift to the Renwick Gallery of a collection of the work of sixty-three contemporary basketmakers assembled by collectors Steven R. Cole and Martha G. Ware, A Measure of the Earth offers keen insights into what Nicholas R. Bell views as a kind of revival of traditional basketry in America over the past fifty years. All collections (whether they are developed by professional curators or passionate individuals) are shaped by forces such as personal preferences, scholarly perspectives, and particular circumstances. The selection of baskets in this collection was based on the collectors' knowledge of particular forms or traditions, geography, and financial resources. Cole and Ware started building their collection in 1986 with a clearly stated interest in collecting only American baskets that they perceived to be both functional and made without dyes. Special attention was given to collecting the work of basketmakers who had a deep knowledge of the materials they harvested and used in their baskets. In short, the focus of the collection was to be American baskets made by basketmakers for whom the process of making the basket was as important as the final form. In contrast to the highly interpretive contemporary basketry of, for example, the studio craft movement or contemporary fiber arts world of today, this collection was to celebrate the individual revivalist basketmaker as master craftsperson of functional baskets. The collection was built by meeting basketmakers in their communities-not in art galleries.The donation of this collection prompted the author and curator, Nicolas R. Bell, the Fleur and Charles Bresler Curator of American Craft and Decorative Arts at the Renwick Gallery, to undertake oral histories with those basketmakers represented in the collection (those who agreed to be interviewed). The result is reflected in this handsomely produced book that features an essay by Bell, who builds a case for this group of baskets and basketmakers as representing a revivalist movement that he connects to the back-to-the-earth movement of the 1960s and 1970s. He argues that this revival has taken place outside the typical folk process in which family and community inform the passing on of tradition. Rather, he believes that these makers of "proper baskets" were influenced by earlier indigenous, African, and European traditions that were once active in the United States but which, in his view, have been on the wane. He stresses that the basketmakers included in this collection (and the related oral histories that he has assembled) represent a response to this trend by a small group of individuals who are swimming upstream against the global forces of today that are leading to the "decline of the basket.'The essay seeks to make this case with sections on Basket Traditions, Competition and the Decline of the Basket, Rediscovering the Basket, Harvesting and Preparing Materials, Conversing with the Past, and Grappling with the Future. Bell concludes that while some would contend that the future of "real honest" baskets appears grim, there is still hope that the practice will continue. …