Barbara Heins on her Basketry Practice

Barbara Heins on her Basketry Practice

Shaelagh Cull

Barbara Heins

Malting Tower at the Tett Centre

It's hard to find basketry courses in Ontario. So originally, St. Lawrence College and Brockville had a Summer School of the Arts. So most of that's up in Halliburton now, but it used to be in St. Lawrence College and I took a basketry workshop there at least 35 years ago and this woman Ankaret Dean is known as the basket maker of Ontario and she has organized lots of things. And so when I heard she was teaching a workshop there, I went and did a week long workshop with her and have stayed in touch with her and things she does over the years as well. And so my mother had made baskets with us as kids. So I the basic techniques, but through that workshop, and then we actually had a basketry conference in Toronto one year again, mainly due to Ankaret Dean. And we had a woman from Sweden came and taught all about birch bark baskets, and we had all kinds of different people and that was very stimulating. And so I try and make you know, some baskets, particularly in the summertime, but even in the winter. I try to make some every year and try new techniques.