Investing in your community’s imagination for 50 years!

April Stone

April Stone

Black Ash Basket Maker

April Stone, an Ojibwe Black Ash basket maker from the Bad River reservation in northern Wisconsin, has been working with black ash since 1998.  She spent one year studying a basket in use before attempting to weave her first basket in the spring of 1999 and ended up falling in love with all things connected to this craft including live harvest and log processing of raw material into usable splint for weaving.  Since 2000, she has researched and traveled extensively, sharing her skills with young and old. 

April harvests all of her raw materials from the ceded territory swamps and forests of northern Wisconsin and processes it all by hand, providing beautiful, natural material for her own baskets and for baskets made by others. She believes in the traditional skill building of handwork and the healing power of making baskets and has received much recognition for her working knowledge of Black Ash basketry, while being thought of as a patient and gentle educator.

This is a photo of a basket I made in May of 2023.  This basket was modeled after an older style basket that I had come across from a collections visit to New York in 2016. It was one I wanted to replicate because of its beauty.  The curly-q surface embellishment was an afterthought, and not part of the original basket I had seen but I thought it might be a nice touch. A dye bath of purple corn husk & cob was used to dye the Ash splint with (the prepared splint had been sitting in an aluminum acetate mordant bath over night). 

What energizes you as you consider the future of the arts in Wisconsin?

The possibility of engaging is what energizes me about the future of the arts in Wisconsin. 

As a basket maker who harvests and processes all of my own natural materials from the forests, there is a deep level of engagement as I walk across the landscape, finding myself in the various ecosystems where the live harvest of certain trees or plants or roots happens. I am connected to place, to weather, to the animals who call that place their home. I am connected to spirit. I am there with intention and purpose and respect. 

Processing these materials holds another level of engagement in that I must process this material into the working pieces that are needed to make the final piece that can be held and used by myself and others. In order to process it, I must have some understanding of what the material is and what it is capable of doing. Holding and working the material engages my senses, not only connecting me to my culture today, but also to those ancestors who came before me and who are no longer in the living world…relatives who carried knowledge of that same material. 

When the final piece has moved from my hands to the person who will take ownership of it, the story of that basket is transferred with it, providing yet another possibility of engagement in its new life with its new person. 

This is how I see engagement through the arts. I am but one basket maker who makes baskets for a living, shares my working knowledge of the materials, and teaches others how to empower themselves through making a basket of their own to use and enjoy.  If I can find such wholesome reward through this action, then just think about what happens when many people are doing the same kind of work, just with different media. This is when the possibilities of engagement become endless. 

Where can we find your work?

You can find April’s work on her Instagram @april.l.stone and contact her via email here: april@stonehouseweaver.com,