Local artist Amber Wilke makes keepsakes out of nature

When thinking of art people generally picture paintings. However, there are various mediums in which art can be expressed. Amber Wilke is a local artist who expresses her art through making baskets.

Wilke works at Clean Harbors during the day. Her husband works their farm. Despite the busy nature of her life, she manages to make time for her art. Wilke weaves baskets out of pine needles. Her specialized interest and talent in the art form of making pine needle baskets is the result of her father's art.

Don Story, Wilke's father, is a wood carver. He started carving in 1995 and has since only honed his skills and developed a style to his craft. Story started taking his carvings to wood carving fairs to compete. It was at one of these shows that Wilke was pulled aside by a woman who taught her how to make pine needle baskets.

"The wood carving shows were great, always something new to look at, but after you made your way around and said 'hi' to everyone you knew, there wasn't much to do. So one day a lady there offered to show me how to make baskets, and I got obsessive," Wilke said.

Wilke recalls retrieving pine needles from her own back yard and using those in baskets.

"I realized quickly that the pine needles I got from my pines were not going to be the best for making my baskets. So I called up the woman who taught me weaving and asked her where she got her needles," Wilke said.

Wilke then began ordering her pine needles. This way she was able to have access to much longer and much softer pine needles. She made more traditional baskets and soon over time began to add on to her work in a very creative form. Wilke began making memory bowls and baskets out of keepsakes.

"I started with jewelry, trying to incorporate it into the baskets, you know, family heirlooms, that sort of thing," Wilke said.

Wilke will take bowls, wooden or ceramic and weave pine needles around the top, building onto the existing bowl in question. She also began putting pieces of jewelry in the bottom of the bowls and covering them with lacquer.

"Everyone has their own little trade secrets, and they try to keep certain things that make their pieces unique under wraps. That's my lacquer technique, I have spent a lot of time figuring out how to get it just right, so I try to keep that to myself," Wilke said.

Lacquer often fills her bowls and hold in place a piece of jewelry, buttons, flowers, or sometimes even candy. However, it is often a mystery how she can use so much lacquer and not have air bubbles throughout her work. Hence her secrecy.

Since Wilke enters her baskets in contests, she must often times travel great lengths and set up a display booth. Her booth can take about two hours to set up and take down. Thankfully, she has the help of her mother and father, the Storys.

"One of the ways I have really been able to connect with mom and dad through my adult life is by doing the wood carving and basket weaving shows with them," Wilke said.

While her parents often help her with her baskets she returns the favor by helping them with her father's wood carvings. Wilke's father is a talented carver who is self taught.

"I started out with the wrong tools, and it was really hard and then I found out you can get special wood carving tools, so I started getting books on the subject and getting the tools and working on getting it right," Story said.

Story along with his wife and Wilke attend carving fairs where he usually enters a few pieces for judging.

"Honestly, it's not about the awards. It's about seeing old friends and getting to spend time with my wife and daughter," Story said.

While Wilke does sell her work and does commissioned pieces, Story does not do either of those things.

"I like to carve for my family," Story said.

He has done several works that are for his family's enjoyment. He carves his wife a rose out of a different exotic wood for their anniversary every year and also carves her unique jewelry.

"I would never sell my carvings or do commissioned pieces. I carve for me and my family," Story said.

Carving is such a time consuming effort that often some carvers make fifty cents an hour on some of their pieces.

In Wilke's case, she weaves everywhere. She can take her pine needles on the road with her when she rides with her husband to different places if he needs to go somewhere for work. That being the case Wilke accomplishes a lot. She makes baskets for wedding gifts, she made one for her son when he got married. She makes pieces that mean something.

Her talents do not go un recognized. She does compete and has taken home many blue ribbons. However, much like her father, it isn't necessarily about the winning.

"It's nice to win. It feels good, but it's about making the friends at the shows and learning how to be better. Plus, I get to spend time with mom and dad, and especially with their support, I accomplish a lot," Wilke said.

Wilke and her parents plan on attending a few more shows for carving before the end of fall, in which both her and her father will compete in several categories.