On Saturday I visited the Lummi Reservation. They were having their annual Native Art Market at Northwest Indian College. It is fascinating to see the wonderful weaving ~ baskets, blankets.
I had a nice visit with Courtney Lipson who is a non-native studying under weaving Chloe French. Both women have work at the Stonington Gallery in Seattle.
Courtney was weaving on her warp-weighted loom ~ she was working on her first blanket.
The blanket is a Wedding Robe ~ she’s marrying in August. She leg-spun the warp from February through September and is now weaving.
She showed me her weaving draft ~ there’s a lot of work to be done before August!
Her frame loom was made by her partner who added special carvings.
The idea that these robes are all created by hand manipulating the warp and weft boggles my mind. The time and skill it would take to finish a piece is unreal.
While I was visiting with the weavers, these young women came into the room to sing.
When they were finished, I walked around and took some shots of the incredible baskets.
As I headed to the door, I took one last shot of this gentleman in his woven cedar bark hat ~ notice all the cedar baskets on his table.
I’m lucky to live only 15 minutes away from the Lummi Reservation. The land is beautiful ~ eagles, hawks, falcons, owls ~ they are all there and it is a perfect bird watching area.
It is wonderful that the Lummi group invites the whole community out to enjoy this event. Thank you!
Gunalcheesch tlein (thank you very much - Tlingit)
ReplyDeleteThese are wonderful pictures of the Art Market and Courtney's and my work.
The girls singing are from the George familly. The woman behind the spruceroot basket is Kitty Young from Petersburg, Alaska. The man in the hat is Floyd Warbus.
Our style of weaving is not warp-weighted but I can see why you thought that. The coverings at the bottom of Courtney's warp are only there to keep it clean. There are no weights in them. We weave using the basketry technique twining. The warp is free hanging, that is there is no tension on it.
Thank you again for this.
Chloe