Theresa Secord

Theresa Secord (born 1958) is an artist, basketmaker, geologist and activist from Maine. She is a member of the Penobscot nation, and the great-granddaughter of the well-known weaver Philomene Saulis Nelson.[1] She co-founded, and was the director of, the Maine Indian Basketmakers Alliance (MIBA) in Bar Harbor, Maine.[2]

When apprenticing with basketmaker Madeline Tomer Shay, Secord learned that she was one of few young Wabanaki people who was taught to make brown ash and sweet-grass baskets.[3] After Shay's death, Secord founded MIBA in 1993 as a way to preserve Wabanaki language and culture.[4] In 2003, the MIBA received the International Prize for Rural Creativity in part for lowering the average age of basketmakers in Maine from 63 to 43.[5]

Her work has been shown at the Hudson Museum at the University of Maine, at the National Museum of the American Indian in New York, and at the Southwest Museum of the American Indian in Los Angeles.[6] She is the great niece of the renowned Penobscot dancer, actress and writer Molly Spotted Elk, and her great-grandmother is Philomene Saulis Nelson, considered an "acclaimed weaver."[1]

Education

Secord earned a B.A. in Geology from the University of Southern Maine in 1981 and an M.S. in Economic Geology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1984[7]. She served as Staff Geologist for the Penobscot Nation[8]. Secord studied weaving and Penobscot language with Madeline Tomer Shay from 1998 to 1993.[1][2]

Awards & Honors

In 2009, she received the Community Spirit Award from the First Peoples Fund.[9] She was named a 2016 National Heritage Fellow by the National Endowment for the Arts,[10] [11]and the 2017 Bernard Osher Lecture speaker at the Portland Museum of Art.[12] She received the "Prize for Women's Creativity in Rural Life" by the Women's World Summit Foundation in 2003 for helping rural basket makers rise out of poverty, becoming the first US citizen to receive this award.[13][10] Secord presented her work at the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in Geneva, Switzerland.[1]

References
  1. 1951-, Everett, Deborah (2008). Encyclopedia of Native American artists. Zorn, Elayne. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press. ISBN 9780313080616. OCLC 328280157.
  2. "Theresa Secord: Weaving New Life Into a Dying Art". Native Peoples Magazine: 36–37. 2006.
  3. "Masters and apprentices". My Maine Stories. Retrieved 2019-08-15.
  4. Neuman, Lisa K. (2010-11-07). "Basketry as Economic Enterprise and Cultural Revitalization: The Case of the Wabanaki Tribes of Maine". Wicazo Sa Review. 25 (2): 89–106. doi:10.1353/wic.2010.0015. ISSN 1533-7901.
  5. Mundell, Kathleen (2008). North by northeast: Wabanaki, Akwesasne Mohawk, and Tuscarora traditional arts (1st paperback ed.). Gardiner, Me.: Tilbury House, Publishers. ISBN 9780884483052. OCLC 221960560.
  6. "Contemporary - Hudson Museum - University of Maine". Hudson Museum. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  7. 1951-, Everett, Deborah (2008). Encyclopedia of Native American artists. Zorn, Elayne. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press. ISBN 9780313080616. OCLC 328280157.
  8. Baron, Robert (2010). "Sins of Objectification? Agency, Mediation, and Community Cultural Self-Determination in Public Folklore and Cultural Tourism Programming". The Journal of American Folklore. 123 (487): 63–91. doi:10.5406/jamerfolk.123.487.0063. ISSN 0021-8715. JSTOR 10.5406/jamerfolk.123.487.0063.
  9. "Theresa Secord". Textile Fibre Forum. 29: 26. 2010.
  10. "Theresa Secord". NEA. 2016-06-27. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  11. Writer, Bob KeyesStaff (2016-06-30). "Penobscot basketmaker wins nation's highest honor in the traditional arts". Press Herald. Retrieved 2019-03-26.
  12. "Maine Gallery Guide". cafedesartistes.mainegalleryguide.com. Retrieved 2018-10-11.
  13. "Dawnland Voices Wabanaki News". 2004. Retrieved 2018-10-11.

Published Works


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