Nancy Basket – Basket maker & fiber artist (Walhalla, South Carolina)
Driving down Main Street in Walhalla, South Carolina, you might not notice the home and gallery of Nancy Basket. Native flowers and vines, a stocked koi pond, fruit-bearing fig trees, and a massive ancient mulberry all conspire to create a ‘secret garden’ just beyond the curb. Add a 100-year-old barn made of kudzu bales and repurposed architecture and this becomes the perfect setting for a basket maker and fiber artist deeply connected through time to her First Nations heritage.
“My way is showing other people how to get ahead with the weeds that grow in their own backyard,” she says with a knowing grin.
As the oldest of four children with a single mother, her family didn’t have plastic toys from the store. “But we had a chicken coop. And mama scrubbed that thing inside and out so we’d have a playhouse. It turned out to be the most popular one in the neighborhood,” Basket recalls.
In later years, she applied this resourcefulness into making baskets from pine needles; helped revive the lost association of basketry guilds; and ended up in South Carolina.
“I came to the upcountry for the longleaf pine needles, to learn the stories of respect, and find my Cherokee story. That same year, hurricane Hugo hit. I went into the land after the storm, and was just sick. So I connected with the forest service, and returned with their permission to harvest fallen pine needles,” she shares.
As Basket continued to create and learn over time from the Elders “who hold and harbor the knowledge,” she wanted to “continue to plant the seeds of respect.” For over 30 years now she has taught in rural and inner city public schools. “My medicine is to work with the younger people who may not have anyone in their family or close by that have skills to teach. It doesn’t matter your age, or how small something might seem. Everyone has a gift to contribute.”
Some of her favorite projects involve working with teenagers. “We’re getting the high schools and agriculture departments interested in growing native plants such as indigo, rye, and so forth.” And her hands-on art always comes with lessons. “The old stories are current today, and students need to hear that different is just different—not ugly or bad. This is something I try to impart in my work with the Juvenile Justice System particularly. They can change their paths (before it’s too late), and put their hands to a good and useful purpose,” she states.
For over a decade, Basket has worked in the region and across the country educating and inspiring survival groups, earth skills gatherings, herb collectives, and members of the Catawba Nation, among others.
“I have a Catawba apprentice who knows about history, growing plants, and working with young people,” she says. “He could’ve gone elsewhere, but chose to live on the reservation nearby. We currently have a river cane project (to restore a 2.5-acre plot). Back in the day, it was so thick a horse couldn’t push its way through. But recently, it all bloomed and then died off, which happens every 50 years or so. No one had ever seen this. So this is now our work together.”
Her creations have earned the attention and respect of many organizations including the National Indian Education Association, multiple museums, several colleges and universities, the National Forest Service, many state departments of education, public television productions, a Smithsonian festival nominating committee, and two movie companies. For the latter, she set dressed “Young Indiana Jones” and “The Last of the Mohicans” with her handmade baskets, mats, and masks made of cattail leaves, bark, and corn husks.
One of her most interesting and often maligned choices of material is the kudzu vine. It is non-native to this continent, but Basket views its tenacity and success as an opportunity. “It grows 12 inches per day just looking for someone to love it. That’s me! So I went to Japan to learn the old ways.”
She explains that this member of the pea family has been used for centuries to make cloth, paper, woven items, and even food and medicine. Now she offers 300 different designs of folk art on kudzu paper in her gallery, all handmade. And, she crafted nine, 5-foot kudzu chandeliers that mimic the African weaver bird’s nest for the Pittsburg Zoo.
Basket harvests all her own kudzu to create vessels, sculptures, and lamp shades in her “playhouse” (kudzu bale barn). Using a whiskey barrel, galvanized tub, and blender she grinds the kudzu leaves and lets them ferment for two weeks in preparation for handmade paper. “They smell really bad during this part,” she says as she adds coffee to the current batch for color. Then, with a needlepoint screen and a piece of felt, she drains out fibrous goo that will hang on a clothes line, dry, and become one-of-a-kind paper – smooth on one side, textured on the other, and scent-free. She also catches the dripping water for her plants. “Find a way to use everything.
“And,” she states, “if you don’t have kudzu, honeysuckle or other vines and plants that need pruning around the yard will do just fine.
“Everybody can celebrate the arts,” Basket concludes. “It’s about working together in a community and in your own yard with your two hands. This is a cottage industry that I’m happy to share. I want to leave as much as I’ve learned for people to carry forward. Please take my ideas and make them your own!”
Looking ahead: In addition to learning how to make kudzu cloth on the loom sent to her by her aunt in Portland, Oregon, Basket will be the artist in education for the Native American Studies Center, University of South Carolina, Lancaster.
Nancybasket.com | gatewayartscenter.net | South Carolina Arts Commission – southcarolinaarts.com
Starter Kit/Insider Tips from Nancy Basket
Join a class, or find someone that does the work you want to learn. (“You can only do so much on YouTube!”)
Find your local agricultural extension agent to put you in touch with who’s growing and working with the materials you want to use.
Locate historians in your area and learn from them.
Read books.
Conduct online research at earthskills.org.
“Make face-to-face relationships with people. Offer to help with something they need in exchange for education and experience. This is the perfect community for a barter system economy.”
Basket welcomes visitors to her home and gallery, and requests appointments.
The story above is from our November/December 2019 issue.
