deborah valoma portfolio

united states

Deborah Valoma is an experienced weaver, spinner, crocheter, and basketmaker, but only began to practice Armenian needlelace in the last few years. She first learned the basic knot from her grandmother in 1974, described in the story “Picking Up Needle and Thread.” Sadly, however, her skills were rudimentary when her grandmother passed in 1993.

Deborah’s great-grandmother Margrit Varteresian Sohigian, a survivor of the Hamidian Massacres (1894–1896) and emigrant from Kharpert located in the Armenian Highlands in what is now Turkey, likely learned from her mother Yeghsapet Kouyoumjian Yeramian, and in turn, taught her daughter Sara Sohigian Magarian in the Armenian-American diaspora. But under the pressures of American assimilationism, the generational transmission stopped there: Sara’s daughter (Deborah’s mother) Margaret Elizabeth Magarian expressed the matrilineal creative force through the Western tradition of oil painting.

But as a fourth-generation Armenian-American and a textile specialist who researches, writes, and teaches about other textile traditions in jeopardy, Deborah decided to reclaim the practice as an act of solidarity with her foremothers. She states: “I felt compelled to help revive my own ancestral tradition in the Armenian-American diaspora.” To that end, Deborah sought out Armenian elders who could provide her hands-on instruction. She worked with Azadig Bidanian (Fresno, California) and briefly with the late Susan Lind-Sinanian, who at the time was the textile curator at the Armenian Museum of America (Watertown, Massachusetts). But Deborah’s skills are still in the beginning stages; her work has been experimental, focusing on repetition and materiality rather than pattern and design.

After retiring from full-time academic administration and teaching at California College of the Arts in 2024, Deborah maintains an active art making, researching, and writing practice from her studio in Berkeley, California.

Deborah is a co-founder of the Armenian Needlelace Initiative.