JEREMY FREY -    Best of show  Heard Museum's Invitational only in Phoenix 2011!   BEST of SHOW - SWIA 2011 Santa Fe Indian Market...  Only 2nd time in 85 years that same artists won these 2 most prestigious "bests" in the same year.  This basket is a similar basket to the BOS winner (that had "point curls" over the white stripes, this does not)  -  see photo of Jeremy and winning basket in slideshow above. 
 
 A larger piece (his medium size urchin basket) by Jeremy Frey, acclaimed Passamaquoddy basketmaker. 

This is one of my favorite basket shapes - the sea urchin basket, here done in bold black and white, a favorite combination of Jeremy's customers.
An urchin basket is such a perfect "maine" shape for Maine Indian basketmakers to form and they have been doing so for over 125 years (see photo of Penobscot basketmakers w/urchin baskets in slideshow above - Photo about 100 years old - faces and names not shared at request of relative of basketmakers pictured)

Sea urchins are found all up and down the Maine coast (See photo of sea urchin shell in slideshow above and you will see how this basket form got it's name" 

Made of brown ash splints, traditional material of Maine and Eastern Canadian Indian basketmakers, with plain tidal sweegrass binding the rims of the basket and the lid and also used as the starting weavers at the center of the lid and the basket bottom. 

This basket is 7" in diameter.  It stands 3.25" high to top of lid with the imbricated round handle attachment adding another .5" to over all height (4" high at top of handle attachment)   The opening is 3" in diameter, the bottom diameter is 2.5" and the round wrapped ring handle (inserted into the imbricated round attachment) is 1.25" in diameter. 
 
Photo of Jeremy in the slideshow was taken at last year's Heard award ceremony (where he won best in show) 

 Jeremy's list of honors is quite long and most impressive.  Here I will list just a few of his most recent.
    Best of show  Heard Museum's Invitational only in Phoenix 2011.  
    BEST of SHOW - SWIA 2011 Santa Fe Indian Market.
  Jeremy is the youngest of 50 $50,000 2010 USA artists’ grants recipients. Chosen for the caliber and impact of their work, the USA Fellows for 2010 ranged in age from 32 to 71, represent some of the most innovative and diverse creative talents in the country. They include cutting-edge experimenters and traditional practitioners from the fields of architecture and design, crafts and traditional arts, dance, literature, film and media, music, theater arts, and visual arts.
 
  Jeremy's work is part of the Heard, Abbe, Hood, Peabody and Hudson Museums permanent collections and he has been featured in exhibits at all of these museums   Jeremy Frey, is arguably the best current Maine Indian basketmaker. Certainly Jeremy, just in his thirties, is one of the most honored.  Taught to make baskets by his mother, Gal Frey, Jeremy was raised on the Indian Township reserve located on the Canadian border, near Princeton Maine