When I attended a small craft fair recently at the American Indian Health & Services (AIH&S) in Santa Barbara, I didn’t buy anything.
Not that there weren’t lovely handmade items for sale; I guess I was just not in a buying mood. I hadn’t made any purchases at the SBCC School of Extended Learning craft sale earlier that day, either.
What I did take home from the AIH&S fair, though, was a flyer promoting a free, three-day Cultural Resiliency Workshop happening in January.
And I would come to learn that sheet of paper was a gift in itself — a gift of knowledge about our local Indigenous population; their masterful basket weaving; and their tireless efforts to keep Native American craft and culture alive.
I also came away with the gift of some new friends whose paths might not otherwise have crossed with mine.
Back home from the AIH&S craft fair, I quickly signed up for the basket workshop (spaces limited, the flyer noted).
The Jan. 9-11 workshop was hosted by AIH&S in partnership with The Heard Museum in Phoenix, Arizona.
Thanks to a series of grants over the past 11 years, The Heard Museum has been offering interactive programs on everything from pottery and basketry to tribal foods, cow-processing, moccasin-making, and shoe-painting.
“The crux is to save the art of Native communities. It is a wellness-oriented program,” said Marcus Monenerkit, director of community engagement at The Heard. “We are focusing on basketry because it is an art that is disappearing.”
The idea that basket-making is a vanishing craft is notable in Santa Barbara County because Chumash baskets are considered among the best in the world.
On day one of the workshop, participants were privileged to view some of those iconic Chumash baskets, with their signature rim ticking and intricate designs, in the collection at the Santa Ynez Chumash Museum and Cultural Center in the Santa Ynez Valley.
The next two days we received introductory lessons in basket weaving from our very accomplished — and very patient — instructors Jilli Oyenque and Monique Sonoquie.
Oyenque, who lives near Taos, New Mexico, is of Ohkay Owingeh descent. Sonoquie’s ancestry includes Chumash, Tongva, Yaqui, Zapotec and Irish.
Sonoquie currently lives in northern California, but used to live in the Santa Barbara area, where in 1999 she was instrumental in running the Indigenous Community Initiatives, which was designed to promote the heritage of Santa Barbara’s Chumash community, particularly to families and children.
Santa Ynez Chumash Museum and Cultural Center
On Friday, our group of about 15 got ready to climb aboard a repurposed school bus (painted black with the words Cultural Resiliency Workshop 2026 in white lettering on the side) for the 45-minute journey to the Santa Ynez Valley via San Marcos Pass.
Before heading out, though, we gathered in a circle in the AIH&S parking lot (on State Street at Los Positas Road) for a traditional smudge pot ceremony, a spiritual cleansing designed to purify one’s body and rid it of negative energy.
Kiana Cates, AIH&S communications coordinator, knelt down and carefully set fire to a few sprigs of sage that were resting in an abalone shell. Then, using her hands, she fanned clouds of the aromatic smoke around herself from head to toe.
The smoldering shell was passed around the circle until everyone had completed the ritual and was open in mind, body and spirit for the day’s adventure.
At the Cultural Center, sisters Dawn and Lisa Valencia, Chumash tribal members who both volunteer as docents, welcomed us.
Echoing Monenerkit of The Heard Museum, Dawn Valencia said the Chumash Cultural Center is designed to promote awareness of Native Americans past and present.
“We want the public to know we are still here,” she said. “This is our home, we are in our land. We are docents, but we also welcome you to our communities and our homes.”
Built on tribal land, the museum’s dome-shaped sections are reminiscent of the design of traditional Chumash dwellings, Lisa Valencia pointed out.
Outside, a life-size bronze sculpture by Native American artist George Rivera is inscribed with the words: “kiyiskihia a kiyiswana’n a siyatyatik,” meaning “Keep Our Culture Alive.”
Playing a key role in preserving that culture is the museum’s important collection of contemporary, historic and unique Chumash baskets.
“It is rare to see so many pristine Chumash baskets in one place,” Lisa Valencia said. “Some of them have hundreds of stitches per inch.”
The baskets were acquired from several sources, including collectors, families and tribes. One of history’s major basket-keepers was Gaspar de Portolá, a Spanish soldier and governor of Spanish-ruled Baja California in 1767. De Portolá visited tribes along the California coast, amassing baskets from them during his expeditions.
Chumash baskets were and are used for all manner of things, from utilitarian vessels for carrying food and water, gathering fruit, fishing, even toting babies; to treasure baskets for holding shell money and other valuables; to intricate presentation baskets commissioned as artwork/gifts for officials and dignitaries during the Mission Period (about 1769-1833).
One such distinctive presentation basket, while not in the best of condition (the bottom is missing), is considered by some to be the jewel in the crown of the exhibit.
It was produced in the early 1800s by Maria Sebastiana at Mission San Buenaventura in Ventura.
One of those expert weavers who could work hundreds of stitches per inch into their creations, Sebastiana wove the design of a 1771 Spanish coin into her basket.
Whether she made the vessel of her own volition or was forced to make it because of her artistry has not been established.
Both inspired and intimidated by the creations of master craftspeople like Sebastiana (300 stitches per inch — yikes!), we headed back to Santa Barbara anticipating the weekend’s weaving lessons.
First, a bit of history
Robert Howe, a Coastal Band Chumash, opened the morning on Saturday with an Indigenous welcome song, a brief history lesson, and a bit of sadness about the plight of the Chumash.
“We [the Chumash] were one people right along this coast and farther inland until the high mountains would keep us only along the coast, where we would sail tomol back and forth to the islands and trade baskets,” Howe said.
“The way we survived and became ever present was that we were peaceful,” he said.
Unfortunately, the tribal members were so peaceful and gave so much of themselves that people took advantage of them, Howe said.
“What I have experienced is that our ancestors were so giving that they gave up their lives and their culture to assimilate within the new America, and what we struggle [with] today is the same,” he said.
“The electronic and technical age is just blasting us with extra stuff that we have to understand, but at the same time we can’t let go of our culture,” he said.
“That’s where if you have a basis in life, and it’s your culture, and it’s your belief system, and it’s solid ground, then that means welcome, welcome to our land, this is our land, which could be your land, too,” he said.
Learning to weave
Baskets are made the same all over the world, we learned. They are produced from a variety of materials, such as juncus, sumac, deer grass, red willow, and sea grasses.
But more goes into making those vessels than what Mother Nature provides.
“A lot of prayers go into our baskets,” said Oyenque, a traditional red-willow weaver, who implored us: “My only request is [for you] to weave happy because the willow will know.
“Creating a basket takes patience and focus. Do it when you are happy. Clear your mind.”
I guess the smudge pot ritual helps with that.
“A lot of baskets have their own mind,” said Sonoquie, who weaves with various types of kelp and sea grass. “They are living beings; they take their own shape.
“Whatever a basket wants to do it’s going to do it,” she said, warning that what a weaver envisions might not be the way the finished product turns out.
These baskets with their human-like properties deserve special treatment, Sonoquie said.
“When a basket baby goes to another family, I tell them to nourish the basket once a year,” she said. “Put some food in the basket; give it life; gather around it with your family.”
The basketry process begins with sourcing the materials, a time-consuming task that is not for the faint of heart. Lucky for us, our instructors brought in a plentiful supply of red willow reeds, grasses, and sea kelp that we would need.
It takes about 3.5 hours to make a basket (if you know what you are are doing), Oyenque said. It takes a lot longer and is riskier to harvest the materials.
“I have fallen in every waterway from Albuquerque to the Colorado River to get just the right willow,” she said. “I’ve been chased by a beaver across frozen ponds.”
While the red willow she uses tends to be prolific, and bushes on the Rio Grande can grow up to 20 feet tall, global warming is taking its toll, Oyenque said.
“Climate change has confused the willows,” she said. “When I first gathered, the willow was 10 to 12 feet tall, but because of climate change it is not as tall and does not send off as many shoots.”
As a result, Oyenque said she is always cognizant of her own role in maintaining the delicate balance between human needs and preserving nature. She returns any unused bits of red willow to the waterways, and she asked that we give her any leftovers we had at the end of the day.
Reintroduced to the rivers and creeks, red willow will take root and flourish, she said.
Picking up four long, thickish willow shoots, and sitting down on a rug in front of us to start her demonstration, Oyenque said, “I weave in winter sitting on the floor because that is how I was taught.
“I want straight shoots with no off-shoots because they create weak spots,” she explained.
The goal was for us to make what would normally serve as the base of a basket, but ours would end up as a medallion or an ornament. There would not be enough time to complete a full basket.
Oyenque took eight more pieces, about 8 inches long, that she put in front of the first reeds, held them together with her fingers in a sort of cross-hatch design, then secured it all with a thin rod placed diagonally over the whole thing.
From that point she lifts up another long, pliable willow and begins an under-over circular weaving pattern starting at the center and working outward.
If you think that all sounds pretty elementary, you would be wrong. By the end of the day, I’m not sure what hurt more, my hands or my brain, but it was a satisfying soreness.
Later, Sonoquie showed us how to weave with treasures from the sea. While you have less control over how a kelp basket ultimately turns out, the materials are softer and more pliable, so easier on the fingers.
“In our villages in the past, all the weavers were men because [the women] were doing everything else,” Sonoquie said.
Today, men and women make baskets together in weaving circles that are as much social gatherings as they are places to create the vessels they hope will carry their culture into the future.
Sonoquie also said it is traditional to give away the very first basket you make.
Hmmm … I wonder who will be the lucky recipient of my first attempt.