Namibia, Omba Arts, Kavango Open Basket 1

DIA 36cm x H12cm

This basket was made in the Kavango region of Namibia along which, the famous Okavango river ows before reaching the delta in Botswana. G!hiriku and Sambiyu-speaking women walk long distances, sometimes to the river to collect riverine grass and then to palm elds where they gather the wild palm. Along the way they will also gather leaves, the bark of trees and other natural materials which they pound and boil in water before soaking the palm in order to get the beautiful palette of mauves, lilacs, chocolate brown and sienna. Seated on the ground, usually on a piece of fabric that she wraps around her body when she walks, the weaver will commence with making her basket. She shreds the palm into thin strips, soaks it in water, wraps the palm around the inner coil of grass. An awl is used to pierce a hole through which she will pass the palm thread. Slowly the basket emerges, coil upon coil. This basket will be dierent to the basket her grandmother made. It will not 

be used for harvesting pearl millet, the staple food of her people. Rather she will focus on the all quality points she learned in the Omba workshops and she will focus on the pattern, to ensure the basket is an object of unique beauty.