Gary Trentham

http://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=36746 9-20-11

Born: Gleason, Tennessee 1939

Gary Trentham won a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts while teaching at Auburn University in the late 1970s. He took a summer off from teaching and devoted his time to making baskets that were meant to be suspended in the air. Hanging Basket, which is constructed from strips of linen, was one of a series inspired by Native American arrow quivers. The fabric resembles dried strands of grass that would not stand up well to the sharp tip of an arrow, suggesting that Trentham did not intend for his basket to be used. The long, slender form evokes a cocoon, as if something might be growing within the mass of tiny waving filaments.