American Indian Baskets: Building and Caring for a Collection

Over 750 color photographs illustrate this long-awaited guide for collectors of vintage Native American basketry. Decades of basketry research inform the text, guiding basket lovers to a better understanding of these woven treasures. Clear images and concise descriptions, presented in an extended gallery showcasing hundreds of baskets, delineate specific tribal styles within Native North America's nine basketry regions: Southwest, Great Basin, California, Plateau, Northwest Coast, Arctic and Subarctic, Plains, Southeast, and Northeast. Unique to this book is an in-depth comparison of imported baskets being passed off as American Indian work. The cultural and historical background as well as the influence of the "Indian basket craze" are also examined. Valuable guidance on buying, selling, and caring for baskets includes a frank discussion of legal issues impacting basket collectors. Rounding out this essential reference are comprehensive regional bibliographies, Internet resource listings, and a directory of American museums exhibiting Native American baskets. AUTHORS: Bill and Sarah Turnbaugh are anthropologists with university teaching and museum experience, whose interest in Native American craft-arts such as basketry and Southwestern jewelry has been expressed through two previous Schiffer books.