Contemporary Baskets

In "Natural Origins: Contemporary Baskets," Fountainhead Gallery in Queen Anne showcases seven artists who take a traditional craft and twist, embellish, and imagine it in new directions. It may come as a surprise that some nationally-recognized basketry artists live in the Seattle area—and that "basketry" doesn't have to look anything like a basket. "There are parts of the country where this is hotter than glass," says gallery owner Ron Peterson. These fiber artists use materials that range from innovative to inspired variations on traditional. Jan Hopkins' By the Sea (pictured) displays a playful use of natural materials—bull kelp, waxed linen, oyster shell beads—sewn together to create a most unnatural undergarment, a bustier. Inspired by Southwestern native basketry, the Everett-based Hopkins also stitches leathery orange peel and hole-pocked lotus pods into her work. The rippling frills of Dona Anderson's Leaf Basket owe their fragility to sewing-pattern paper, the instructions for which are pleated into mysterious calligraphy. Jill Nordfors Clark binds her baskets with a honeycomb weave of pig gut (sausage casings!). Local artist Polly Adams Sutton uses copper wire to hold together her shimmying cedar bark and ash vessels that are essentially sculptures. The wire gives them their distorted tension-molded form, and a pretty light-catching glint. Marilyn Moore also uses polynylon-coated copper wire—a merciless weft that requires intense handwork. She seamlessly blends together different shades into richly glistening vessels and a whimsical teapot with legs. Using willowy reeds and papier-mâché, Mary Merkel-Hess' painted creations have a wild brush of reed sprouting from the top, while Elizabeth Whyte Schulze paints colorful primitive figures on her reed, pine needle, and raffia wares. With all due respect to basketry artists throughout the ages, in these examples, the art transcends its humble origins. Reception: 4-7 p.m. Sat. July 8. Fountainhead Gallery, 625 W. McGraw St., 206-285-4467, www.fountainheadgallery.com. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Thurs.-Fri., noon-5 p.m. Sat.-Sun. Ends July 30.