Core Memory: Louisiana Native American Basketry
Image: Darlene Langley Robinson. Coiled and sewn storage basket with lid, 2000. Longleaf pine (Pinus palustris) needles, coyyihissí, raffia, pahí. Collection of the Williamson Museum, Donation of Ron Wilkinson.
Louisiana Native American Basketry, co-curated by Dayna Bowker Lee, Ph.D. and Teresa Parker Farris, brings together works from five Indigenous Nations: the Chitimacha, Choctaw, Coushatta, Tunica-Biloxi, and Houma; and casts light on more than thirty Native American fiber artists. Six contemporary weavers are profiled in the exhibition including Chitimacha artist John Paul Darden; Coushatta artists Marjorie Battise and Myrna Wilson; Houma artist Janie Verret Luster; Jena Choctaw artist Rose Fisher Greer and Tunica-Biloxi/Choctaw artist Elisabeth Pierite. Their remarkable creations from pine needles, river cane, cypress, and palmetto serve as important emblems – and transmit living cultural identity in dialog with tradition, from one generation to the next.
The Core Memory exhibitions, Louisiana Native American Basketry and Encoded, put into conversation two modalities of weaving: Indigenous basketry and the emergent field of systems-based textiles.
About the Exhibition
On View
February 19 – June 25, 2022
CoreMemory: Louisiana Native American Basketry
Curated by Dana Bowker Lee, Ph.D. and Teresa Parker Farris
Louisiana Native American Basketry features over 100 baskets made by over 30 artists from 5 Indigenous Nations based within the present day boundaries of Louisiana.
The Core Memory exhibitions, Louisiana Native American Basketry and Encoded, draw from the creative legacy of the H. Sophie Newcomb Memorial College and its prescient synthesis of art, craft, and design to understand weaving technologies. Core Memory puts into conversation two modalities of weaving: Indigenous basketry and the emergent field of systems-based textiles. The exhibit explores disparate approaches toward media, tradition and composition – and investigates the animating forces within each artist’s creative practice.
