Monique Sonoquie
Ancestry: Tongva / Chumash / Yaqui / Zapotec / Irish
Based In: Goleta, CA
Email: sonoquie@hotmail.com
Website: sonoquie.wixsite.com / youtube.com/channel/UCd6rQEkE2oUb8R9dJigAtGQ
About the Art
As a Basket Weaver, I gather and make baskets with traditional materials such as tule, Juncus, Hazel and Willow sticks, and more recently with Kelp/Seaweeds. With limited access to gathering sites and materials, due to toxins, land loss and climate change, I have found alternative materials to preserve culture and land. My new found challenge and exploration is weaving and creating with recycled materials, combining passions of Traditional weaving and my dedication for “Refuse, Reduce, Reuse and Recycle.” During my fellowship to the Institute for American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe 2018, I explored and represented Traditional lifestyles by reclaiming post industrial waste, and evolving from her recently created electronic cables baskets to life size sculptures.
Even more recently, I broke my right wrist and was unable to weave (or much of anything else) I started painting with my left hand (I’m right handed). Adapting to my new dexterity challenge combined with the Covid stay in place alongside some friends in the mountains where I can sit under the stars every night, I have started a series of left handed paintings reflecting our Celestial and Earthly Relatives. The first two pieces in acrylic I am submitting today.
About the Artist
As an Artist, Basket Weaver, Documentary Filmmaker, Youth Advocate, Traditional Food and Medicine Gatherer, Educator, Romiromi Practitioner and EarthMother Protector, I have tried to embody many aspects of my rich Cultural heritages into my life and work. Because of this I have become adaptable to any terrain, inspiration and/or affliction using my Indig-enuity and multidimensional knowledge of mind, body and spirit.
My degrees in Political Science, Teledramatic Arts and Technology, Early Childhood Education and Administration, have prepared me for work teaching and developing cultural and educational curriculum. Although I teach, I identify as a student first and have found myself in the middle of a lifelong journey of gratitude and righteousness.Through my California non-profit, The Indigenous Youth Foundation, Inc. (based in Santa Barbara and working throughout California), and independently, I have provided presentations in the classroom and on the land, such as Tule Basket Weaving, Sacred Site preservation, and Traditional Medicines, answering the calls of Elders and youth where I have lived throughout California and beyond. From sponsoring Native Family Health Days, to authoring children's books (The Beginning of the Chumash), organizing murals in schools, producing cultural videos and hosting Traditional Healers, I focus on the teachings of sharing that are so essentially part of our cultures.
I consider myself fortunate to have been offered many workshops and trainings regarding Native health and wellness. I have been trained directly by Maori Practitioners of Traditional Romiromi Healing in Aotearoa, hosting my teachers in the Native communities I have worked in, advocating, practicing and teaching this and other traditional Native healing practices. My work and art has always been to teach others, however, in my 50’s, I am now taking time to create my own art, for myself.
My art will always reflect my cultural knowledge in imagery, language and knowledge. I work with traditional (tule, kelp), contemporary (acrylics, photography) and recycled materials (blinds, food bags), whatever is available in my location. I am un-federally recognized, like the majority of Chumash descendants (I am submitting genealogical documents), so I don't have access to many traditional gathering sites, as do most of the Chumash youth and families I work with.
