Baskets, Combs and Fish Nets

We visited the Peabody Museum at Harvard today and got to see some pretty interesting objects made from banana leaf, straw, clay and materials from North and Central America as a way to inspire us into thinking about what the sugarcane and rice by-products we'll be experimenting with could be used for.

A lot of the objects were woven, which reminded me of my grandmother's house in Ningbo. All of her chairs are woven, as are her mattresses and pillows. I really enjoyed being around them, even though they may or may not have been comfortable for me.

I think the word that would characterize the makers of the objects we saw would be "resourceful." They really knew how to make what they had into useful, functional objects that could act as protection from the rain or a carry-on bag. There were definitely aesthetic considerations to each object, such as the intricate patterns in the weaving of some of the baskets or the alternating colors in straw mats. But ultimately what impressed me the most was how practical they were.

Having said that, my favorite object from the collection was a basket that had metal pieces strung around its outside edge. When the curator picked it up, it made chime-like sounds that gave me a very strong sense of the kind of place it could have come from. As we couldn't touch any of the artifacts ourselves, it was helpful for us to experience them visual and aurally.