Jewellery Week dazzles
Artist Keri-Mei Zagrobelna always knew she had Whakatū whakapapa.
But she might never have imagined that her work, an ongoing enquiry into ancestry and indigenous reclamation through jewellery, would sit within the same walls of the sacred hei tiki of rangatira Merenako, Zagrobelna’s tīpuna.
Zagrobelna said it was a “huge honour” and “quite emotional” to have her art hanging in the same space.
Based in Wellington, Zagrobelna has been part of Nelson Jewellery Week taking a workshop on creating talismans, as well as having her art on display in a solo exhibition at the Nelson Provincial Museum, and a group exhibition at the Suter.
The Nelson Arts Council produced event brings jewellery makers, aficionados and collectors to Nelson for a week of workshops and masterclasses, floor talks and panel discussions, social events, and more than 35 exhibitions.
Zagrobelna draws on her whakapapa for her work, using the whakatauki “E hara toku toa, I te toa taki tahi. Engari he toa taki tini”: success is not the work of an individual, but the work of many.
And it’s that collective work and memory that Zagrobelna takes inspiration from. Both her European and Māori ancestry are fascinating – her grandfather Edward Zagrobelny was one of the Pahiatua Polish refugee children who came to Aotearoa after the war.
Here in Whakatū, Zagrobelna descends through the Park family to Merenako, a high ranking rangatira (chieftain), thought to be have been over 100 years old when she died in 1888.
Her exceptional hei tiki was stored for years in a Bank of New Zealand vault in Nelson on behalf of the Cawthron Institute. For decades, its origin was unknown, but eventually, after it was discovered that it had belonged to Merenako, it was placed in the care of the Nelson Provincial Museum in 2009.
“I’ve always known I had connections down in Whakatū,” Zagrobelna said.
“But having the hei tiki there and everything else around that … is one of the many ways that I can reconnect.”
In her talisman making workshop, Zagrobelna will be encouraging those taking part to explore their own lineage or whakapapa through their work – for instance by using ancestral symbols, animals, or flowers, such as a Scottish thistle.
Or if someone was Irish Catholic, that might be by looking at symbols within Catholicism, or using family crests or charms.
“For me, jewellery is quite a healing process, so it can foster connection on a spiritual as well as a physical level. So I’m hoping that some of that can pass on to the students.”
She also put thought into the use of jewellery as a vehicle to bring cross-cultural relationships together.
“Often silver isn’t seen as a traditional indigenous material to work with, but to other people, it may be, so it can work as a bridge between cultures, working in that form.”
Nelson Jewellery Week was important, she said, not only for the industry, but also for the wider community in inviting people into the conversation of what contemporary jewellery was, or inviting people in to explore.
“The festival is fantastic,” she said, “and I can only see it getting bigger.”
Nelson Jewellery Week 2025 runs from April 10 to 16. A full programme can be found at https://www.nelsonjewelleryweek.nz.
By Warren Gamble, Nelson Mail
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