>>ED CARRIERE: I come from the Suquamish reservation.
Suquamish Washington.
A little town of Indianola.
My great grandma, she was the one that wove these really beautiful clam baskets
for the tribal clam diggers.
And so I would watch her when I was little.
When I got about 14 years old, I got brave enough to make my own clam basket.
That led me into basket weaving.
It’s really satisfying to go out and,
oh, cut tulles or cattails.
If I collect it, I got to make something out of it, you know?
I can’t just let it sit there,
because it’s sitting there saying, hey, use me, use me.
[CHUCKLES]
Make something out of me.
[CHUCKLES]
>>AMY TJIONG: We have a lot of baskets in our collection.
The plant materials themselves in these baskets, over time,
they dry out, they become embrittled,
and sometimes when we have to treat objects, it can get complicated.
The Northwest Coast Hall is over 100 years old,
I’m part of the team that is updating, restoring, and conserving the hall.
The conservation team has been tasked with conserving 800-plus objects
for display in the new hall.
That involves making sure that the objects are stable for display.
It's really important to us to get input and guidance from the community members.
We were hoping to find somebody who would be able to
tell us more about the materials that we see in these baskets,
and the technologies.
We had reached out to our core advisors
and Northwest Coast basketry scholars.
Everybody said that we should reach out to Ed.
>>CARRIERE: This clam basket…my specialty.
[CHUCKLES]
What got me started in weaving.
>>TJIONG: We invited Ed to visit the conservation lab for a working visit in 2018.
He brought, I mean suitcases full of plant materials that he had harvested,
and baskets that he had woven.
And at the same time, he would have the opportunity to view objects from his area,
the Coast Salish region, within the collection.
>>PETER WHITELEY: We have a great variety of baskets
from people all up and down the coast.
Haida, Tlingit, Kwakwa̱ka̱ʼwakw, Nuu-chah-nulth, from everywhere.
But Coast Salish are distinctive.
The symmetry of the designs,
the complexity of the weaves,
that's something that Coast Salish is especially known for.
Basketry, wooden boxes, those were people's containers.
People in this part of the world didn't make pottery like they do in the native Southwest.
And there are many different types of baskets for different purposes
with a very sophisticated technological knowledge that goes into them.
>>CARRIERE: So there’s the clam basket, and then the burden basket.
The folded bark basket.
And then there's the hard-coiled cooking basket.
The weave is so tight that it forms a solid wood vessel,
and so it would hold water.
then they could put foods in it and hang hot rocks in there
and boil foods quickly in that type of a basket.
Which I thought was incredible.
[CHUCKLES]
It was my goal to weave like my ancestors did.
So I fulfilled that through archeology and through museums,
and seeing these old pieces that are stored away.
>>TJIONG: Having him bring the harvested materials to the Museum,
that's just one piece of a larger story.
There were many reasons for visiting Ed at his home.
Many of our advisors have told us time and time again how important it was
for us to visit the land where they came from.
That we will never truly understand until, you know, we've breathed the air,
until we've seen the landscapes.
>>TJIONG: He took us he took us along the beach to a sandspit
where we were able to harvest these grasses that were taller than us.
>>CARRIERE: They’re a little fragile, but once you get ‘em woven,
they’ll make a really pretty little basket.
>>TJIONG: Into the forest where you had cherry trees and cedar trees growing.
>>CARRIERE: Now, when I make a folded bark basket, I use the whole thing.
>>TJIONG: When it comes to the materials, we only see the finished product.
Getting to see these raw materials is helpful so that we're able to identify
what we see in the baskets.
>>TJIONG (On-screen): Oh wow, big difference.
>>TJIONG (VO): He taught us how to distinguish between,
say for example, bear grass and swamp grass
And this isn't something that you would be able to do just by looking at a basket.
You would really need to feel the length of the grass.
>>TJIONG: He taught us how to split the cedar limbs into several layers,
each one that could be used for weaving.
>>CARRIERE: If it goes to one side, pull to the other side.
Just kind of feel it out. [CHUCKLES]
>>CARRIERE: The difference between a basket maker and a basket weaver
is a basket maker buys some of his fibers at the store,
but a basket weaver goes out and collects,
splits and makes his own warps and wefts
and his own fibers to weave the basket with.
So there’s a difference there. [CHUCKLES]
>>TJIONG: Many of our advisors, including Ed, they have such a deep understanding
of these materials and the technologies,
more so than we do as conservators.
Just because, unless you've grown up with these materials at your doorstep,
you know, these traditions are handed down to you through generations.
It would only make sense that they've amassed this deep wealth of knowledge.
>>WHITELEY: As we think about how to display these baskets,
we're really dependent upon the advice of our advisors,
and they've offered a great deal of new information
that we hadn't even been aware of previously.
It’s essential to collaborate with First Nations communities,
and artists, and scholars, and historians.
You have to have those perspectives because that's where the knowledge is,
that's where the understanding is.
>>CARRIERE: A basket tells the story of those people.
Even when I’m weaving one of those, I can actually feel my ancestors helping.
I can feel them helping my fingers and my hands do the right move to weave with.
So I really believe in that theory of
through basketry we have a direct link to the past,
to our ancestors way back.