Art Medium: Jewelry

My mentors encouraged me to use the cactus because it’s a symbol of being O’otham, and of being here as stewards of the Southwest. The saguaro is now an element in my work. I also incorporate different techniques and have created my own style. 

The cactus motif, the desert landscape, the desert animals are all a representation of this region. We’ve been residents for a long time, one of the first residents of the Sonoran Desert. I grew up living on the reservation with my family and was taught about how we relate and connect to the land. 

For me (creating jewelry), it’s not necessarily for financial gain, it’s more of a statement. It’s about creating something that is both wearable and a reflection of this land, where we come from.
I think that it’s my spiritual duty to be able to represent my people from generations before me and to generations ahead of me. 

This silverwork is going to last for a long time, if people take care of it can last forever. People can use it as an heirloom to pass it on, each piece has a story to it, and it represents our people, the Tohono O’odham people here in Southern Arizona. 

Check out more of Quinton and his amazing artwork on his Instagram!

Hello, my name is Mark Talayumptewa. I learned silver work through the mentorship of Gerald Lomaventema and Jerolyn Honwytewa. They both have shared their knowledge and experience, and I am grateful for the time they took to teach me the step-by-step processes of the art. They encouraged me to try, improve, and continue my efforts. Silversmithing represents a significant history of a long line of Hopi silver artists. History of individuals who learned an art form through past trading with relations established outside of Hopi. Perfecting the art form and enabling individuals to express themselves spiritually, culturally, and mentally. Also providing the opportunity to make a living to support what is most important to Hopi: my family. My grandfather is one of the many past Hopi Silver Artists. My family is the sole inspiration for everything I do. I myself have the feeling of accomplishment, self-expression, and cultural expression, and drives my passion. I express myself through my creations.

I learned my art form as a little girl growing up watching my parents. My dad is a wood carver, he makes kachinas and my mom is a painter.

My dad told me that in creating art I would have to speak to people and tell them what my pieces are about. Each piece I create has its own story. As I create my art the story comes from within my heart, my mind, and what I see. As the stories play in my head, the designs, colors, and images emerge, insects, animals, the sky, the stars, the water, the rocks, anything in mother earth and out of mother earth. 

The story that I create is not for me, it’s for that person I’m supposed to meet. 

As I grew up all of my family members were artists. My family gave me knowledge and ideas about my stories and these are part of the stories I create in my jewelry. I put my heart and whom I meet into the piece. 

My aunt’s husband, Gerald Lomaventema, knows my work and liked the details, descriptions, and stories behind it. He asked me if I would be willing to be part of his class. He wanted me to put my paintings and images in silver. He shared his knowledge and the history of how he learned from the Hopi Guild. This is part of our history and our culture and who we are to this day.

Everything in the pieces, the design, the images, and even the stones all represent healing. These are blessings for our people and everyone on this earth. We all plant and we all create something new, by doing this we’re giving back to mother earth. We’re giving her our blessings, our prayers, and our songs. 

Learn more about the unique Qwa-Holo Hopi Silvercraft here.

Hello, my name is Yvette Talaswaima. I am Qäö- Wungwa (corn clan) from the village of Musungnovi on Second Mesa. I have 3 daughters and 3 grandsons. 

I learned my art form from my husband  Gerald Lomaventema in 2003. Gerald use to work at the Hopi Co-Op Guild and when it closed he started working out of our home. He built a studio next to our home. At this time I helped him finish the jewelry. Doing what I called “the dirty work”, because I was always black from polishing the jewelry.

Over the years I picked up little things and our studio was always open. I could go in there and teach myself how to do different techniques. It was up to me if I really wanted to learn.

I started by making Hopi chains.

My husband , Gerald was getting a lot of orders for chain and he asked me if I wanted to try. At that time I was scared of the torch and didn’t want to ruin anything so I started by flattening some wire and started with big links to solder. 

Now, I specialize in making handmade chains. In addition to chain, I also learned how to cut with a jewelers saw. Using different flower designs and I love to design different flowers.

My hallmark is the lightning bolt, it was used by Uncle, Dawson Numkena.

We base our artwork upon Hopi geometric designs and traditions. The designs we use come from rain, water, clouds, prayer feathers, animals, clan symbols and nature.

Learn more about the unique Qwa-Holo Hopi Silvercraft here.

Hello, my name is Jerolyn Honwytewa. I am Corn clan (Qáö’wungwa) from the village of Mishungnovi. I am a Hopi Silversmith, as well as a traditional Hopi sifter basket weaver. Growing up I had watched my mother and father make Hopi overlay-style silver work. We would travel to various art shows around the Southwest. Seeing the art world and the people a part of it encouraged me to learn, so I started creating in 2015. Now, years later I am still creating and learning the Hopi overlay style silverwork. I first learned how to make Hopi baskets from my grandmother. The young girls and women of my family would all go out to the desert and we would help gather yucca plants. Then we would sit outside our grandmother’s house to help clean and split the yucca. Those were always the best times I had during my childhood.
Asquali! (Thank you)

Learn more about the unique Qwa-Holo Hopi Silvercraft here.

Hi, my name is Delwyn Spyder Tawvaya. I am affiliated with the Snow Clan from the Village of Soongöpavi, Second Mesa within the Hopi tribe. I am a Hopi farmer, and a member of the Flute, Katsina & Snake Societies. I am very active in the Hopi calendar life cycle and learning & preserving our way of life. I’m a father of two boys, so I do have eyes watching me as I take on this journey as a silversmith.

I come from a great lineage of silversmiths within my clan, family members, relatives, and uncles, and they learned the technique. I’ve been doing silversmithing silver works since 2016 when I took an apprenticeship program with Gerald Lomeventema, my mentor.

From then I continuously worked with silver using various techniques; it has been seven years now since I have learned the technique of Traditional Hopi Overlay. I have learned other techniques and worked in various museum formats that hold the History of Hopi Overlay Silver. I’m looking forward to more of what, and where, my silver works will lead me in the future. 

Thanks so very much.

Learn more about the unique Qwa-Holo Hopi Silvercraft here.

Shane Beeshligaii

I’m a silversmith. I learned my artform from my dad over the course of my life. I started when I was around seven years old. I design anything from traditional Navajo jewelry to more of a modernized style of micro-inlay that my dad taught me. 

My family have been silversmiths since the Spanish first arrived in the Southwest. I have a great- great-grandfather named Atsidi iilneeh Beeshligaii, which means the maker of silver. My family passed the artform down for generations up until the early 1900’s when my family was more inclined to do railroad work or whatever means to get by. My father started silversmithing when he was in his mid-thirties and I always would loiter around as a kid and watch while he worked on his jewelry.

It was difficult growing up because I was a city Indian, I didn’t grow up on the reservation. 

Most interactions with people from my own tribe were on Sherman Indian High School grounds in Riverside CA, where my mother still teaches pottery and traditional beadwork. It was one of the last boarding schools in the United States. Growing up my mother would teach at the high school and she would always bring me and my brother around because this was one way for us to interact with our own native community. 

I would visit our father during our summer break or whenever we had vacation as a kid. Our parents were divorced and that was one way for me to become more immersed in my culture, and to learn about the culture and our history of our people. 

When I was seventeen, I moved to Tucson and stayed with my father.  As a teenager I’d make jewelry on the side to buy things like video games or clothes, even a laptop.

I constantly hear my father’s voice in my mind, critiquing my work regarding whether or not it’s polished enough, all the scratches are out, if everything looks nice, if all the stones are set correctly, or if I have to rework something. I always have him as a voice in my head, checking over me. At the same time, it’s me, holding my work to the standards that I’ve learned. 

I make jewelry because it’s the main way for me to keep in contact with my cultural heritage. To understand and embrace my culture and make a meaningful life in modern day society. I think there’s still room for advancement within jewelry. The one main focus of the work I’ve been learning over the last 30 years is micro-inlay which is my dad’s checkerboard pattern of overlay work.

I make whatever I’m inspired by. I want people to be able to express themselves through my work. As long as it makes that individual happy or feel inspired, that’s what I try to do with all my pieces. 

Check out this video by AZPM of Alex and Shane Beeshligaiis culture and their amazing silversmithing story!

My name is Elena Mendez I am from the Tohono O’odham tribe. I grew up in a little farming town called Stanfield, Arizona, and was the only female in my family; I have three brothers.

Times were hard for my father when we had rainy days and he’d be out of work. So my mother continued the basket weaving that she learned from her Auntie when she was 13 years old, she taught me when I was 14. My mom got invited to basket weaving shows in Scottsdale. My father would drive us and help us sell our baskets — this was my mother’s employment and how she helped my father support our family.

I was proud of my parents later in life and now that I have four kids, I’ve taught my two daughters how to weave as well. My eldest learned at 12 and my youngest learned at 9. Now we weave together and attend events here in Tucson. I love and appreciate my mother for this artistic gift I inherited from her.

I learned my art form at a young age from my mom, dad, and my grandma. I started by picking yucca and devil’s claw with my grandma when I was four or five.

We’d go out to different villages where it’s growing and I’d help. Later on, as I grew a little bit older my mom taught me how to weave horsehair

By the age of seventeen, I started weaving yucca and bear grass.

The Moho (Bear Grass) and Dakwi (Yucca) are a reflection of our culture. A long time ago the O’otham would use these baskets for storage. They weren’t made to sell. They used the baskets to store their food. Now I tell my kids we never used to make our baskets this small.  A lot of them were really big baskets that’s why when you go to museums you see the big baskets and nowadays you don’t see those anymore. 

It’s a blessing to have learned and to know how to make them. It’s good because now I can teach my children and grandchildren. 

Beadwork and shellwork have been in our culture for a long time and people often incorporate them in their baskets. The shells come from the ocean, and the ocean to us is really sacred. We used to have warriors that would run to the ocean to pray to the ocean and they would bring back salt. To us, salt is like a medicine and we use it for ceremonies.