Weaving history and heritage into an art form

November 27, 2011|By Janet Mendelsohn, Globe Correspondent

When the Museum of Fine Arts opened its Art of the Americas wing last spring, Theresa Secord was invited to demonstrate her artistic process and discuss the cultural significance of ash and sweetgrass basketry. “Ours was once a very prominent art form,’’ the Penobscot basketmaker and executive director of the Maine Indian Basketmakers Alliance said recently. “Beginning in the 1800s, summer visitors came from Boston and New York specifically to buy baskets on Indian Island on the Penobscot Indian Nation reservation, where my family is from,’’ Secord said.

But over time, fewer elders passed along their knowledge to the next generation. Fearing the loss of a vital part of their heritage, Secord and others formed the alliance 20 years ago to preserve their tradition within Maine’s four federally recognized Wabanaki tribes - the Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, Maliseet, and Micmac nations - and expand its visibility in the state and beyond.

On Dec. 1, more than 50 artists, including Secord and Jeremy Frey, whose work this year won the top prize at the country’s two largest Native art festivals, will participate in the Maine Indian Basketmakers Sale and Demonstration at the Hudson Museum on the University of Maine’s flagship campus in Orono.

“The market is an opportunity for visitors to learn about the history and cultural traditions of Maine Indian communities,’’ said Secord. “They can hear traditional language spoken, hear traditional music, learn about threats to indigenous traditions from an invasive pest. It is an opportunity to meet Maine Indian artists, especially basketmakers, and to purchase art directly from them. For us, this is a very important retail marketing opportunity as there are few places to sell Maine Indian baskets in winter here.’’

It’s also a celebration. There will be storytelling and demonstrations. Children can make sweetgrass angels during their own workshop and drum with the Burnurwurbskek Singers. Wabanaki artists and their invited guests from other Native American communities will talk informally about how they create baskets, quill jewelry, wood carvings, birchbark, and bead work. Of four annual MIBA-coordinated markets, this and the Native American Festival in July are the largest.

It takes an artist’s practiced eye to select the right tree. Once felled and cut into sections, the wood is pounded to separate strips from the logs. Then weavers pull the strips by hand through sizing gauges, wooden tools with metal teeth at one end that slice precise widths. Supplies of 10 or more widths are generally kept on hand, sorted by the wood’s natural color - black, white, yellow - or tinted with natural or commercial dyes.