Open Collections

Abstract

Artist Ruth Asawa (1926–2013) used a wire basketry technique to create a series of looped-wire sculptures that defy clear categorization. Through close analysis of the work and considering social and historical factors, we can better understand what it meant that Asawa chose to work with a basketry technique to create her looped-wire sculptures between the 1950s and 1970s. Baskets have a strong connection to utility as containers. Martin Heidegger’s notion of “the Thing” (Das Ding) and author Ursula Le Guin’s short essay “The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction” provide theories of what a container is and enable questions regarding what it means that Asawa created metaphorical, non-functional containers to gather together her experiences in life and art. Asawa’s time at Black Mountain College provides social and historical context for ideas and philosophies that she experienced as she was developing her looped wire sculptures, specifically the living and learning environment of the college, her classes with Josef Albers, and the American reception of Zen Buddhism. A survey of traditional and contemporary basketry practices provides context for the differences and similarities of Asawa’s use of basketry techniques to other basketmakers at that time. Through an analysis of Asawa’s choice of material, labour intensive process, and choice of form, I emphasize the importance of the making experience in her artistic practice. An examination of the fibre art movement demonstrates Asawa’s changeable relationship to the artistic movements of her time through her installation choices. Ultimately, this thesis argues that Asawa’s use of a basketry technique to create her semi-permeable, looped-wire sculptures helped her to flexibly and continuously redefine the space of their internal and external environments. Placing the sculptures into an unresolved state of existing “in-between,” Asawa sought to challenge norms and defy the categorization of her work, community, and life as a Japanese-American mother in postwar America.