Ep 3 BASKETMAKER
When Joe Hogan decided to become a basket maker in rural Ireland in the 1970s, he had never made a basket in his life. What he had was a young family to feed, a philosopher’s restless mind, and an elderly neighbour who showed him how to weave a creel – the square, upside-down baskets traditionally used to carry turf on a donkey’s back. Joe mastered the technique. Then, after a decade, he did something that would once have been considered almost sacrilegious: he started making baskets with no function at all. Form, beauty, and the preservation of a vanishing skill became ends in themselves. In this episode, Joe’s been commissioned to make a basket for the O’Connell Gallery in Clonakilty, which they hope will be part of a wider exhibition held in New York. As he weaves his basket, he reflects on how the bends in the road of life led him to this point.
