Unbreakable Threads: How One Family Reconnected By Making Stunning Jewelry

Photo by Jack Rodgers/NHMU

By Olivia Barney

Creating art, like telling stories, brings people together. It builds bridges, mends wounds, and connects people across generational and cultural backgrounds. Perhaps that’s why works of art have been found and studied across every known civilization — we can’t help creating it. The expression is part of what makes us human.

For twenty-three-year-old Diné artist Jasmine Sandoval, the artistic act of jewelry making is less a hobby and more a rite of passage that keeps her connected to her family. In many ways, it’s in her blood.

Jasmine specializes in beadwork, taking the time to hand-bead earrings, bracelets, necklaces, keychains, and more — an exquisite and vibrant selection that you can shop at NHMU's Indigenous Art Market & Festival. She comes from a family of jewelry makers, though over the years, each family member has developed their own style in their preferred medium.

From childhood, the foundational skills were taught and passed down to Jasmine from her grandmother. Jasmine recalls being six years old, walking into local restaurants and banks in Arizona or New Mexico, arms filled with handmade jewelry. “We’d tell them we were raising money for school supplies,” she said. “Now that we’re all older, it’s a bit harder. I have to fight social anxiety, but I’ve learned to turn it off — to be confident in my art.”

In childhood, her days were spent with cousins and grandparents, constantly learning from and alongside them. Now that Jasmine is grown, her family is more spread out, living across several states, making it harder to spend time together. Still, it’s the craft of jewelry making that brings them back together.

Photo by Jack Rodgers/NHMU

Sitting at a table filled with shimmering beads and natural stone, Jasmine and her relatives give each other advice, make each other pieces of jewelry, and catch up on the details of each other’s lives. It’s as if the act of making jewelry gave the family a pathway to reconnect, and they took it eagerly.

Photo by Jack Rodgers/NHMU

Which is why Jasmine won’t only be selling her own work at the Indigenous Art Market & Festival — she’ll also be offering a variety of pieces from her cousins, aunts, and mom. Though the rest of her relatives can’t make it to the market themselves, they’re sending Jasmine with a wide representation of what the family artisans have to offer.

Dreamcatchers Are Protectors in Navajo Culture

Jasmine’s mother, for example, makes stunning dreamcatchers. Dreamcatchers play an important role in Navajo culture, and Jasmine emphasizes this. 

“It's our protector. It captures our dreams, where they swirl into the middle, and then they just indefinitely stay there,” she explains. “I was taught to wake up before the sun rises. You're supposed to pray. Manifest a good day. And, you're supposed to put these out into the sunlight, or before the sun rises, so the sunlight can hit it and burn the dreams away.”

After being cleansed each morning, the dreamcatcher can be placed back inside your room — and no, it doesn’t have to be placed above your bed, anywhere in your room will work. It’s a daily ritual of sorts, one of cultural and spiritual importance to many Indigenous groups.

A Family Legacy at the Indigenous Art Market & Festival

Photo by Jack Rodgers/NHMU

When asked what she was most excited about ahead of attending the Indigenous Art Market & Festival for the first time, Jasmine lit up at the idea of seeing her family’s work all in one place — united like it hadn’t been in a long time. 

But this mental image quickly gave way to another thought that Jasmine wanted her Indigenous brothers and sisters around the nation to consider — one of reconnecting with their roots, ancestry, and heritage, no matter where they are.

“Sometimes natives, they kind of lose their way in life. They forget that they have a home. But I was reminded this year: It's better to reconnect than to disconnect — always.”