Black Ash Basketweaving

Learn about one of the oldest artistic forms by Ho-Chunk women. Basket Maker Kimberly Crowley will walk you through how to make a black ash basket and share how important baskets were to Ho-Chunk women as a way to make money for the family. Limited registration. All supplies provided.

This workshop has been developed for an intended audience of older adults 60+.  Others welcome to register, space permitting.

Cancellations require 48 hours notice or will be ineligible for future early registration.

Instructor Bio: Kimberly Crowley (Hoocąk), Black Ash basket weaver

Crowley comes from generations of Black Ash basket Weavers notably, the Hall family. The Halls are well known for their quality craftsmanship and their amazing skill of weaving miniature baskets. “My mother and my grandmother were basket makers. This was their livelihood. She stayed home making baskets. She told me if I wanted to learn, I would have to sit down and just actually watch. So, the best way to learn how to do something is by sitting and watching somebody. I would sit and I would watch her. Through the years, when I was sitting there watching her, I would pick up all her extra little pieces, and I would try to make my own little basket. She would give me pointers. She would actually kind of stop her work and help teach me. But yes, this was her livelihood. So, if we wanted to eat, she made baskets to feed us, and there was 11 of us kids. We grew up in Wittenberg, Wisconsin.

Crowley’s main mentors were her mother and father, but her mother stressed to her that it is important to watch other basket weavers to see how they make their baskets. Crowley recalled one of those weavers was Violet White Wing who lived down the road from them, from whom she would learn different tricks to making baskets. She also recalled when her father would come home from his outside job, he would whittle the thick wooden handles for her mother’s baskets.

This workshop will take place outdoors on the Pinney Patio. In case of rain, the workshop will move indoors to the Pinney Studio