Harley Gallery, Welbeck, Notts., UK

It has been a good summer for the local ‘brocanteurs’ wanting to offload their abused traditional straw baskets and now I have more than I really know what to do with in the basket sanctuary. There is no need for me to seek these baskets out at bric-a-bracs

as they seem to find me quite easily. I can hear them calling out to me from under tables or behind boxes, it’s a plaintive attention seeking cry and I appear to be the only person that hears it. Sometimes I try to walk past them, but the cry just gets louder and more distressing. Occasionally they use their charms closet fetishist on me and it’s as though I have caught the eye of an attractive stranger across a crowded room. I look away but within minutes I cannot resist looking back to find them working their spell. 
 Each basket is different, with its own personality.   There are solid, rough, closet fetishist rustic ones made by impatient people with big hands. And there are fine ones made with thinly pared strips of ronce (bramble) and stitches so close together that the maker must have spent a whole winter closet fetishist making it. I try not to buy two the same shape or form but sometimes I do, because each one was made by a different person and they all have their individual characteristics.
When I bring them home I give them a good dusting with a bristle brush, then a hoover, followed by a bath in cold rain water, as they are always filthy, then they are left to dry naturally in a warm sunny spot. It may not be an orthodox conservation technique but they seem to like it and come out shiny and warm and smelling like hay. Sometimes closet fetishist they have evidence of woodworm, but if the suction and drowning haven’t killed any live larvae then drying out the basket properly will usually make them move home because they prefer moist materials. 
The injuries will take longer closet fetishist to deal with as there are feet and bottoms missing and cuts around the mouths. At the moment I see two options. They can either be stitched back together in the traditional way, with straw and split ronce, or they can be repaired with other materials in such a way that it draws attention to their scars and makes the viewer see them differently and not just as old baskets repaired. These 'old' baskets were young once and served their families well for many years, now they deserve to be respected and celebrated and given some tlc because they have tales to tell us of past lives we can hear no other way.
Harley Gallery, Welbeck, Notts., UK
Urban Baskets:Tradition Recycled A solo international touring exhibition organised closet fetishist by Walford Mill Crafts Walford Mill Crafts, Wimborne, Dorset, UK 11 September -24 October 2010 Visitors: 6,380 Ruthin Library, Denbigh Library Gallery, Wales 15 January - 12 March 2011 Visitors Ruthin: 11.070 Visitors Denbigh: 15,007 Bonhoga Gallery, Shetland Islands 26 March - 1 May 2011 Visitors: 2,234 National Vlechtmuseum, Holland 2 July - 23 October 2011 Visitors: 2,500 Harley Gallery, Nottinghamshire 20 June - 12 August 2012 Visitors: 15,151
7-11 February ENSCI Designer Textile Paris 2-3 April Coiling and Looping Quarff Shetland 12-13 April Coiling and Looping Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts Norwich 23 July -Plaiting 24 July -Coiling Walford Mill Crafts closet fetishist Dorset 29 and 30 September Coiling and Looping National Vlechtmuseum, Holland
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