ExperienceLouisiana Festival

The Folklife Village at the Experience Louisiana Festival is a showcase of Louisiana folk artists and crafts people.
The Experience Louisiana Festival is scheduled Oct. 22 and 23 on the LSUE campus.
The Folklife Village features folk artisans demonstrating authentic, traditional Louisiana crafts and trades.
Festival guests will have the opportunity to speak with the exhibitor-demonstrator and learn firsthand about the craft in a tent.
The festival’s website states it is a high priority that this core component represent the cultural diversity of Louisiana in an authentic way, and that each art or craft exhibited be celebrated and shared with integrity and respect.
Participants listed on the festival website include Calvin Ardoin, Gary Badeaux, Willie Badeaux, Bonnie Boudreaux, Ms. Bursia, Christy Castille, Lora Ann Chaisson, John Colson, Tom Colvin, Linda “Pish” Dahlen, Charlie Daniels, Richard Delahoussaye, Bill Ellzey, Matt Fruge, Rebecca Henry, C.J. Knobloch, Ann Luster, Janie Luster, Jackie Miller, Larry G. Miller, Tommy Myers, Bill Parrie, Doris Perkins, Charlene Quinilty, Clifton Rambin, Sam Riehl, Margo Rosas, Berk Veillon and Myrna Wilson.
Jewelry and baskets
Lora Ann Chaisson
Inspired by rich colorful heritage jewelry and basket weaver artisan Lora Ann Chaisson of the United Houma Nation creates exquisite handmade jewelry using alligator hide famous to the Louisiana. Born and raised in the swamplands of southern Louisiana she creates unique pieces of jewelry that is made from the hide of the alligator and scales from the alligator garfish. Chaisson also weaves Houma half-hitch coil palmetto baskets. Many of her baskets have been on displayed at museums around Louisiana.
Wooden canes and staffs
Bill Ellzey
With family roots on a small farm straddling the line between Natchitoches and Sabine parishes near Marthaville, Bill Ellzey has been collecting and fashioning wooden canes and staffs most of his adult life. Many of those he has displayed and sold at crafts fairs over some 30 years were harvested from the woods on that farm or other family property nearby.
Since he now lives in Houma, some 250 miles from the family farm, expeditions to find raw canes there are occasional, usually coinciding with visits to Natchitochess and Sabine Parish relatives. Other sources of raw materials include trimmings from trees in his own yard in Houma, or those of friends and neighbors, or from specimens found during vacation trips.
Basket weaving, jewelry
Janie Verret Luster
Janie grew up in the Houma Indian community of Bayou DuLarge and still lives there. Her parents were the late John and Mary Verret both traditional Houma Indian artists. Luster is a well-known Houma artist, basket weaver and creates beautiful jewelry using the scales of the alligator garfish. Janie is responsible for reintroducing the Houma Half-hitch method of basket weaving to her tribe, the United Houma Nation.
Traditional Cajun Mardi Gras masks and capuchons
Jackie Miller
Jackie Miller of Iota grew up among old-time Cajuns. She listened to their recipes, remedies, stories, music, and their traditions. As a young girl, she watched her mother, various aunts, relatives and friends, spend quite some time before the start of the Lenten season preparing costumes and masks for the men and teenage boys to wear in their courir de Mardi Gras. This rural Mardi Gras run is quite different from the New Orleans Mardi Gras celebration. In fact, the courir, as celebrated in Tee-Mamou, is thought to have its roots in medieval peasantry. Historians believe that the peasants would construct makeshift masks and costumes to wear as they traveled in groups from house to house to beg for food. In imitation of the fashion of the Queen and other wealthy and powerful citizens, they would fashion conical hats much like a dunce hat, which are called capuchins. The masks used to hide their identity were made from whatever material was available.
Accordion builder
Larry Miller
Larry Miller of Iota was born in Acadia Parish near Iota July 7, 1936, to Abraham J. Miller and Alzena Leger, 97 percent of French ancestry, and grew up speaking Cajun French. His family played Cajun music, his father played house dances on accordion, later Larry on triangle and spoons in family jams. Miller was 42 when he began to learn how to play and build accordions. He has built accordions for 36 years, producing just over 1,200. He has taught 14 people how to build accordions through an apprenticeship of 240 hours, minimum. Miller was one of the 26 founders of the CFMA and served in almost every office.

Cajun Rosaries
Tommy Myers
Tommy Myers has been a resident of Eunice all of his 74 years. Beginning as a teacher at Eunice Junior High, and then retiring from his Manshop by Myers clothing store after 29 years, he and his wife, Lou, now enjoy traveling to the arts and craft shows around Louisiana. He was juried into the Louisiana Crafts Guild 10 years ago for his unusual and decorative birdhouses, and has since expanded into making Cajun rosaries. Many people in South Louisiana make rosaries from Job’s Tears, but he was fascinated when he saw Claude and Pat Oubre’s China Ball rosaries. After learning their processing techniques, he scanned the internet to see how others did it, but found none. Not wanting this Cajun tradition to be lost, he will be promoting it at the Experience Louisiana Festival.
Blacksmith
Sam Riehl
Sam Riehl is among the youngest professionally operating blacksmiths in Louisiana. Riehl, 18, of Lafayette picked up the trade when I was 8. Riehl discovered blacksmithing through Pyromania – Lafayette Art Association’s annual festival centered on fire-generated arts. His mother, Angela Riehl, demonstrated all of the 14 years that Pyro existed. Riehl gravitated towards the blacksmiths of the Louisiana Metalsmith Association.
Hides and beadwork
Margo Rosas
Margo Rosas is an acclaimed Louisiana craftswoman who has spent her days living from the land and extending her Native American artistry to admirers and customers around the world. Growing up in south Louisiana, Rosas learned skills such as gardening, brain tanning and beadwork. Rosas has been sent by the State of Louisiana to represent its rich cultural heritage to France and to Philadelphia. Her travels have included a month-long, multi-city tour on behalf of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, where she was a featured artist for 18 years. A whole advertising campaign was built around Rosas’ persona when she acted as the spokesperson for the Abita Water Company.
Koasati pinestraw basketmaker
Myrna Wilson
Myrna Wilson, a member of the Koasati (Coushatta) tribe in Elton, is the daughter of Bel and Nora Abbey, Koasati traditionalists. Born into a family with strong ties to their culture, Wilson was destined to learn the crafts of her people. She began making pine straw baskets when she was 3. Wilson and her sister, Marjorie Battise, learned to make the coiled baskets, as all of the little girls were expected to learn basketry from their mothers. The baskets were sold to collectors as a primary source of income for the family. Wilson still uses the same materials for her baskets today. The only tool required is a sewing needle and the materials needed are pine straw and raffia, a fiber made from palm leaves.