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Deborah McConnell and Natalie M. Scott hold up their "in-progress" Jump Dance baskets. Photo credit: Robert McConnell Sr.
Deborah McConnell
Deborah McConnell
Traditional Basketry of the Hupa, Yurok, and Karuk of Northern California.
I learned this music like learning a language… it is something sensory… something we feel from the depths of our soul.” – Claudio Vega
Deborah McConnell of Humboldt, is a master basket weaver of Hupa, Yurok and Quinault descent and she has been weaving for 48 years. She started weaving when she was a kid learning from weavers such as Marilyn Hostler, Lila Colegrove, and various other Hupa, Yurok, and Karuk elder weavers. She has worked for the Hoopa Tribe’s Johnson O’Malley Program, and Klamath-Trinity Joint Unified School District as a cultural arts teacher, and is the field office director of the California Indian Basket Weaver’s Association. Deborah is currently a TANF (California’s Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) cultural arts teacher and has the opportunity to work with at-risk kids and adults who are working to maintain a healthier lifestyle.
Apprenticeship Program
2024
Deborah will be guiding Natalie through the process of basketry starting from the essential process of gathering and processing specific materials for a basket cap. This includes gathering and processing: black fern, woodwardia fern, willow roots and sticks, hazel sticks, spruce roots, wolf moss, alder bark. Each material requires their own processing method of splitting, pounding, peeling or boiling with dye which is essential to the basketry tradition. The steps to weave a cap will be taught, including using spruce roots and sticks to weave with overlay, and planning and adding a design.