Sahmie, Bonnie

Hopi-Tewa potter Bonnie Sahmie Chapella Nampeyo was born to Priscilla Namingha Nampeyo in 1958. Her grandmother was Rachel Namingha Nampeyo, her great grandmother Annie Healing and her great-great grandmother Nampeyo of Hano. Among her siblings are Rachel Sahmie Nampeyo, Nyla Sahmie and Jean Sahmie. Bonnie has been the least prolific of them but she has also made some of the largest pieces of any of them.

Like her siblings, Bonnie learned how to make pottery through watching and working with her mother and siblings as she grew up. Through her career she has stayed with the shapes and designs she learned from them. She generally makes polychrome vases and tiles, and black-on-red bowls.