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Folk Arts Marketplace

Vendors invited to participate in the Great Lakes Folk Festival’s “Folk Arts Marketplace” sell authentic traditional arts or related items rarely available in any stores or other festivals. Vendors include past participants in state and regional folklife festivals, apprenticeship and award programs, and other activities of the Smithsonian, Michigan State University Museum, and upper Midwest regional state-funded folk arts programs.

Amish Rocking Chairs and Footstools
Roy Yoder, Ovid, Michigan

Businesses based at home are common among the Amish; there they can more readily adhere to the practices dictated by their religious beliefs. Many earn or supplement their living by making and selling directly out of the their homes or from their horse-drawn buggies or stands along the roadside. Especially popular items are quilts, lawn ornaments, jams, baked goods, and furniture. A number of Amish craftsmen in the Midwest specialize in rocking chairs made of hickory and hardwoods such as cherry, walnut, or oak.
Roy Yoder got his patterns for rocking chairs and footstools from his father-in-law, who also taught him the art of steaming and bending hickory. Roy, in turn, has taught these skills to his son Merle. Roy participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999–2001.

Box Sculptures
George Thomas, Idlewild, Michigan

Born in Atlanta, Georgia in 1940, George Thomas was raised in a family of eight children who moved to Detroit and finally to Idlewild, where he now lives. Using weather-beaten wood, old bed sheets, wire, plaster of Paris, and other miscellaneous found and scrap objects, he creates framed three-dimensional sculptures. He depicts memories of his childhood in Georgia, for example, children in a one-room schoolhouse learning about African-American history, a woman quilting on the porch, a family at the supper table, and a church congregation listening to a preacher.
George uses his box sculptures to help others recognize the importance of African-American heritage. He has participated in youth education programs where he enjoys talking about his art and encouraging young people to make their own boxes. George participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999–2001.

Braided Rugs
Julie Sullivan, Eaton Rapids, Michigan

As is true of many folk artists, braided rugs, made of readily available and often recycled materials, are both practical and decorative. Because wool is durable and stain resistant and the color variations in the braids hide spills, braided rugs are practical to use in any room. From their first use by early European settlers in America to today, braided rugs are an American folk art.
Hand-braided rugs are a family tradition for Julie Sullivan. She learned to braid from her grandmother, and in 2000 and 2001 she was awarded a Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeship award to teach her daughters. Using pure wool, needles, and a tool for sewing called a bodkin, they braid strips, lace the braids together, and connect the braid ends to each other to create a seamless effect. They use the rugs in their own households and as gifts for others. As a master artist, Julie received Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeship awards in 2001 and 2002, and she participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 2000 and 2001.

Cedar Fans and Birds
Glen VanAntwerp, Tustin, Michigan

Glen VanAntwerp makes cedar fans and birds, a skill he learned from his father, Stan VanAntwerp. According to Glen, “As a child, Pa taught me to make cedar fans. I rather think that Grandpa Van learned it from his dad too, who was a Michigan lumberjack.” The technique appears deceptively easy. As Glen once said, all that is needed to make fans is “a block of cedar wood, a sharp-bladed knife, perhaps some water, a little skill, a lot of patience, and a desire to either pass the time or to make something beautiful.”
Glen is well aware of the historical, ethnic, occupational, and family origins of his own carving skills. He passed on his knowledge of cedar fan making to his son Jeremy and daughter Sara when they were children. When Sarah was married, each of the bridesmaids carried a carved fan in lieu of a floral bouquet. Now adults, Sara and Jeremy continue to make fans and plan to teach their own children. Glen is a 2001 Michigan Heritage Award Winner and master artist in the 2002 Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Award. Glen participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999–2001.

Chinese Cord and Jade Jewelry
Angela Welti, Harrison, Michigan

Jewelry made from tied cords and semi-precious stones is a traditional Chinese art that is more than 2,000 years old. It incorporates good luck symbols into the silk cord designs and the carved jade, amber, amethyst, tigers eye pearl, olive pit, or linden root beads. Larger pieces are used as decoration in households or temples. Intricately designed cords with an attached piece of jade are considered a special gift and are handed down from generation to generation. They are also given as gifts when babies are born.
Hsui Chin “Angela” Lin-Welti was born and raised in Taiwan. She began tying cords when she was eight years old. In 1993 she married her husband, Jeff Welti, who was an English teacher in Taiwan. They now live in Harrison, Michigan, where Angela continues to make jewelry. It takes her up to nine hours to complete one cord. Angela participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999– 2001.

Decoy Carvings
Doug Thornton, Kingsley, Michigan

Doug Thornton has been an avid hunter for 65 years and has hunted in various areas of the United States and overseas. He started carving 25 years ago in order to create his own hunting rig. He believes carving decoys has sharpened his observation of wildlife and, in turn, his wildlife observations have helped him improve his decoys.
Doug starts by cutting a tree, preferably black walnut and birch. After aging the logs, he cuts them into rough blocks and shapes and then, using a carving stand, various knives, and rasps, he works out a final decoy form. In addition to using patterns he has made himself, he also uses ones taken from antique decoys, and he enjoys making working decoys of ducks, swans, shorebirds, and loons.

Finnish-American Rag Rugs
FinnWeavers, Farmington Hills, Michigan

Rag-rug weaving is an unbroken tradition in Finnish-American culture, as it is in Finland itself. Immigrants brought knowledge and skills of this craft with them to America and have been making rag rugs ever since. Rag rugs are well integrated into the everyday life of Finnish Americans, and communities participate in the production and use of them. Neighbors donate old clothing; family members and friends help prepare the rags; husbands, uncles, and nephews maintain the looms and make improvements on them; neighbors and friends buy the rugs. In some regions, such as the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, rag rugs have come to be associated with Finnish Americans.
The FinnWeavers is a guild of Finnish Americans that meets on a regular basis at the Finnish Center Association in Farmington Hills, to help each other with new weaving techniques, to assist beginners, to socialize, and to coordinate annual bazaars. For several years members have been awarded Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeships to teach rag-rug weaving to other Finnish Americans, and in 2002, member Bea Raisanen received the Michigan Heritage Award. FinnWeavers participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999 and 2000.

Handspun Yarn and Textiles
Jacqueline Vaughan, Lansing, Michigan

Like many other traditional artists, Jacqueline Vaughan was exposed to her art form within her family. At the age of 81⁄2 years, her mother presented her with her first loom and spinning wheel and taught her the arts of knitting and crocheting. However, it was not until Jacqueline finished college that she truly began to develop her spinning and weaving skills. Wool, fleece, silk, cotton, and alpaca are just a few of the materials she uses. She prepares the fibers, dyes them, and designs original patterns for the many fiber arts in which she is skilled.
Although Jacqueline is particularly interested in the connection between West African textiles and African-American textiles through pattern, color, and function, she believes that textile traditions link and identify all cultures. She is the program director of the Mid-Michigan Knitters Guild, has been featured in Spin-Off magazine, and is involved in the public presentation of this art form and related historical and cultural aspects to public schools, guilds, and art centers throughout the Great Lakes region. As a master artist, Jacqueline Vaughan received a Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeship award in 2001 and participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 2000 and 2001.

Hmong Embroidery
Ia Her, Lansing, Michigan • Teng Yang, Warren, Michigan

Like their relatives in their homeland of Laos and in communities scattered throughout the world, Hmong Americans begin to learn how to make paj ntaub (flower cloth) at a very young age. A variety of patterns, motifs, and needlework techniques, including appliqué, reverse appliqué, and embroidery are used in creating the colorful textiles. Mastery of the techniques and expansion of the repertoire of designs and motifs usually takes years, and expert craftsmanship is valued within the community.
While certain types of paj ntaub are still made for traditional uses such as baby carriers, baby hats, funeral collars, and wedding apparel, most paj ntaub made in the United States today are sold to non-Hmong. Bedspreads, purses, eyeglass cases, pillow covers, wall hangings, and articles of decorated clothing are among the items now produced. Ia Her and Teng Yang participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999–2001.

Musical Instruments
Elderly Instruments, Lansing, Michigan

Elderly Instruments first opened for business in 1972 in a basement location on Grand River Avenue in East Lansing and moved in 1983 to their current location at 1100 N. Washington in Lansing. Elderly features vintage and new instruments such as button accordions, fiddles, dulcimers, harmonicas, and bodhrans and specializes in fretted instruments such as guitars and banjos. With their extensive inventory of instructional books and hard-to-find CDs and cassettes, sold both at their Lansing store and through widely-distributed mail-order catalogs, Elderly Instruments has established itself as an important local business with a national reputation.

Native American Traditional Arts
Nokomis Learning Center, Okemos, Michigan

The Nokomis Learning Center is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the preservation and presentation of the culture and tradition of the People of the Three Fires (Ottawa, Potawatomi, and Ojibwa). The Nokomis Learning Center offers a wide variety of exhibitions, educational programs, special events, and publications. Recent activities have included, in partnership with the MSU Museum, exhibitions and publications on Great Lakes Indian women artists, dance regalia makers, basket makers, and quill-box makers. The Nokomis Learning Center gift shop specializes in selling crafts made by Native artists from the Great Lakes region. Nokomis Learning Center participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999–2001.

Norwegian Knitted Sweaters
Trude Rodli-Culver, Haslett, Michigan

The traditional Norwegian sweaters, hats and mittens that Trude Rodli-Culver knits are a direct result of her Scandinavian upbringing. “Almost every young girl in Norway knew how to knit. I discovered after I came to the USA how this art is almost lost to my generation. Women of all ages always stop to admire what I am doing, but few know it as knitting.”
Like many knitters worldwide, Trude learned her craft through exposure to her mother’s and grandmother’s work, and for as long as she can remember, she has worn knitted garments they made for her. Learning how to make socks at age 11 prepared her for the complexity of knitting in the round, a technique that results in the characteristically seamless Norwegian sweater. Reindeer and snowflakes are popular motifs for these traditional garments, which are worn year-round in Norway. Trude has lived in the Lansing area for nearly 20 years. She received a 2002 Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeship award and participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 2000 and 2001.

Ornamental Ironwork
Perry Ornamental Iron/Mark Millis and Roberta Schneiderman, Perry, Michigan

The Millis family has been welding iron for three generations. As children, Mark and Roberta worked with their father in his shop making trailers and railings and then, using leftover steel fragments, creating ornamental objects. Like his father and his grandfather, Mark Millis made his living as a journeyman erecting steel high rises around Michigan. All three generations of the family also used their welding skills to make iron tables, railings, and gates.
In 1997 Roberta and Mark started doing custom ironwork through their company, Perry Ornamental Iron. Some of the traditional tools they use to craft their designs are a coal forge to heat metal rods and an iron anvil to help bend them into shapes. They also use modern welding equipment like torches and plasma cutters that combine compressed gases to “cut out” figures and designs. Mark and Roberta are recipients of a 2002 Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeship award and participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 2000 and 2001.

Peach Seed Carving
Roger Smith, Culeoka, Tennessee

Roger Smith is a meter man for Duck River Electric Company by day, a farmer by night and weekends, and a carver anytime. Using only a pocketknife, a peach seed, and an idea, he sculpts intricately carved figures—a miniature person, a car, a basket, or a house. These individual carvings can take up to 8 hours to create. Sometimes, Roger carves entire scenes, such as a baseball game in progress, including detailed figures of spectators and players complete with hats, gloves, and bats. His work has been exhibited at the Maury County Fair, the Tennessee Arts and Crafts Fair, and the National Black Arts Festival in Atlanta. His peach seed Santa is a permanent part of the White House Christmas collections. Roger participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival in 2000.

Pysanka
Roman Seniuk, Detroit, Michigan

Roman Seniuk’s earliest memory of pysanka is seeing the intricately decorated eggs in his Ukrainian church on Easter Sunday. They were the most beautiful things Roman had ever seen, so his mother helped him learn how to make pysanka from various kinds of eggs, bee’s wax, a kistka stylus, a candle, and dyes.
In Ukrainian, pysanka stems from the word pysaty, “to write,” because the designs are drawn upon the eggs in a prescribed and meaningful manner. Pysanky symbols include geometric motifs, the sun, the cross, the triangle, endless lines, the tree of life, the church, and fish (symbolizing Christianity). The colors of the dyes are also symbolic.
The tradition of pysanky decorating precedes Christianity and reflects ancient myths in which the egg symbolizes life, the sun, and the universe. The eggs have been used as talismans to protect against evil, and they serve a variety of social and religious occasions. Roman participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999–2001.

Quilting
Flint African-American Quilt Guild, Flint, Michigan

Although there are few known extant examples of historical quilts and little published information on quilt making among early African-American settlers in Michigan, oral tradition firmly establishes that quilt making has been a widespread activity for many years. While many stories have been recorded of similar experiences with quilts and quilting activities, no one type of quilt or quilting activity emerges in the Great Lakes region that can be called typically African-American. All quilt makers, regardless of race or ethnicity, share the basic traditions of quilt designs, construction techniques, materials, and uses. However, by learning about individual quilters, their stories, and their activities, connections can often be made with distinct African-American experiences.
The Flint African-American Quilt Guild was started by Derenda Collins and Jeffalone Rumph in 1989. Members of the group quilt, put on exhibits of their own work, attend quilt classes, shows, and conferences together, and demonstrate quilting at museums, libraries, and festivals, including the Festival of Michigan Folklife and National Folk Festival 1999–2001.

Quilting

Lula Williams, Detroit, Michigan

As a young child, Lula Williams occasionally helped her mother with quilting by putting colors together and piecing. However, she only returned to quilting in the early 1980s when her young teen-aged son encouraged her to take a course in it at his school; she remembered her mother’s techniques almost immediately and has been quilting ever since.
Lula has made more than 120 quilts and won numerous awards. Her work reflects many traditions within her experiences. She is a needleworker keenly interested in the latest techniques and patterns; she is an African- American committed to conveying information about her heritage; she is a woman of faith who communicates her beliefs through her quilts; she is an individual proud of being an American. One series of her quilts incorporates African cloth, paying homage to Martin Luther King, Jr. Another series is of red, white, and blue cloth with designs of stars and stripes. A special quilt, her original “I Am” design, depicts the times Jesus utters “I am” in the Bible as well as the declarations of “I am” by African-American preachers in their sermons. She is perhaps best known for her baby quilts, of which she has made scores as gifts for family and friends.
Lula’s excellent craftsmanship has won her a number of awards and invitations to participate in shows within the African-American community and beyond. In addition she has taught quilting for a number of years at the Evans Recreation Center on Detroit’s northeast side, at the Michigan State Fair Senior Center, and at Detroit’s Westside Tindal Recreation Center and readily assists those who seek her help. She has been recognized with awards of Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeship grants to teach her skills to other aspiring quilters in her community. In 1997 she was honored with a Michigan Heritage Award.

Twig and Log Furniture
Ron Rademacher, DeWitt, Michigan

As far back as anyone can remember, the Rademachers and others on nearby farms in DeWitt, Michigan, used logs and twigs to build utilitarian items like furniture, pole barns, milk stools, and fence posts. Ron Rademacher began woodworking with his father at an early age, and Ron’s father learned from his own father.
Like the other members of his family, Ron Rademacher harvests hardwood from the family farm and gathers logs, twigs, and shrub wood from the local area. Neighbors give him fruit and nut woods, and he recycles slab wood from a local sawmill. He bends, dries, and cures the wood; strips the bark; and carves and whittles the pieces, joints, and decorations to create tables, chairs, mantle pieces, quilt racks, and milk stools. Ron participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999 and 2000.

Ukrainian Embroidery and Gerdans
Eugenia Worobkevich, Warren, Michigan

Traditional embroidery plays an important part in public events, celebrations, and special occasions of Ukrainian-American communities. For festive events, women may wear embroidered blouses and men wear embroidered ties. Embroidery appears on pillows, table linens, cloths placed near household religious icons, and in Easter baskets.
Eugenia M. Worobkevich is a master artist of Ukrainian embroidery. She became a citizen of the United States in 1955 after emigrating from Lviv, Ukraine. In 1973 Ms. Worobkevich’s favorite aunt sparked her desire to learn traditional embroidery. In 1985, she met Oksana Tkachuck, a master designer in Ukrainian nyzynka technique, and became her apprentice. In 1996, Eugenia was granted a Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeship award to teach traditional embroidery to others. She also became involved in making beaded gerdan collars in 1988, because they contain similar elements of color, texture, and form as traditional embroidery. Eugenia participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999–2001.

Wycinanki
Krystyna Rosas, Grand Rapids, Michigan

Krystyna Rosas’ parents were born and raised in Poland, but Krystyna was born in England and immigrated to the United States with her family when she was 5. Her father was a potter, woodcarver, painter, and sculptor. Their home was decorated with many beautiful Polish objects: pottery, amber, weavings, carvings, and of course, wycinanki (papercuttings). Krystyna’s father taught her how to duplicate and design wycinanki when she was a small child; at an early age she recognized that these pieces were a special part of the way she thought of herself and her heritage.
Wycinanki originally decorated walls, ceilings, beams, and furniture in rural homes. The brilliant colors, traditional themes, and beautiful designs of the papercuttings eventually came to symbolize Polish folk art. Today, different regions of Poland produce distinct styles of wycinanki. Krystyna participated in the Folk Arts Marketplace at the National Folk Festival, 1999–2001.