It’s easy to say “don’t judge a book by its cover,” but when it comes to viewing the art of Maru López, human nature begins to take over. When viewing her intricate jewelry designs, a seemingly effortless mix of industrious design and traditional folk art, I had the sense, however vague, that she might be the sort of creative who regales interested parties with stories of fantastical myths about the natural world.

Sure, nature and the culture of her native Puerto Rico figure heavily into López’s designs, but there is also a real-world solemnity behind many of the pieces. Speaking with her in her South Park home, where she has recently relocated her studio after seven years in Barrio Logan, it becomes apparent to me that many of her pieces — from necklaces and brooches, to pins and earrings — are dealing in important issues of resistance, culture and the unreliability of history.

“I’d love to say that I sit down with a plan and with sketches, but I’m very project-based,” López said. “Yes, I’ll start with a sketch but whatever is around me ends up being super influential. Whatever I’m reading or whatever is happening in the city ends up influencing me as well. I’m constantly sponging from the environment I’m around.”

“Objetos de Resistencia” by Maru Lopez, who is one of the jewelry artist featured in “La Frontera” at the Mingei International Museum.

(Courtesy of Mingei International Museum)

While her artistic approach seems instinctive to the point of abstraction, there is something to be said for López’s unique methodology. Much of it is densely research oriented and takes on political and cultural issues even while, on the surface, her works are sprightly and aesthetically pleasing.

“The things that I’m working on and that I’m thinking about, one is going to inform the other,” she said. “I’m flexible and let life mold the work. I won’t sit down to create something or write something if I’m not super prepared with the research.”

She goes on to tell me about a series of recent works that were informed by witnessing the “changing landscape” of Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria in 2017. López grew up in San Juan and spent the majority of her life there, so issues of colonialism and environmentalism are often in her thoughts. In an editorial for the art website Hyperallergic last year, she wrote that she hoped her work would tell “stories that break down colonial legacies of what knowledge is and who is included in the making of it.”

A multimedia piece inspired by the Puerto Rican flag by San Diego artist Maru Lopez.

(Courtesy of Maru Lopez)

“I’ve always been very vocal about the colonial situation in Puerto Rico,” said López, who goes on to say that while her work doesn’t often directly address issues such as colonialism and political issues, the fact that her work is conceptually influenced by Puerto Rican culture is, in itself, a redress of sorts of the way the island’s culture of craftsmanship is viewed and consumed.

“I was thinking about the colonial situation and how Puerto Ricans were resisting this, and so this work became way more political than anything I’d done before,” López said.

As assured as her work has become over the years, López admits she didn’t always know she wanted to be an artist. Growing up in San Juan, she would often join her grandmother and others to craft lace in the mundillo tradition of the island. Still, when it came time for her to head to college, she decided to major in Latin American History at the Universidad de Puerto Rico, San Juan.

“I’ve done creative things and crafts all my life and have been sort of led by them, but it definitely wasn’t the professional path I chose,” says López, who now also works as the Manager of Education and Engagement at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego. “I never expected to veer into art and to dedicate myself to that. For me, that came later.”

López said her experience studying Latin American history came to influence her art practice later in life. She never consciously connected the two until recently, but looking at her art — a fluid and conceptual form of jewelry making and craft — there is evidence that her experiences have come to inform her practice.

“I see now a lot of what I’ve left behind and what I’ve retaken,” said López, who sojourned in New York City, Italy and, most recently, grad school in Asheville, North Carolina, to perfect her craft. She moved to San Diego in 2012.

“Now that I’m in my 40s, I think with time I’ve realized that all that informed my jewelry and artistic work. Now, I see it and it’s so obvious. Now I do it consciously. I’ll think of this stuff as I make and create.”

“Siempre Commigo,” a jewlery piece by San Diego artist Maru Lopez.

(Courtesy of Maru Lopez)

“This stuff,” as she puts it, can be informed by any number of things. For many, jewelry is something that is both functional and adornment. What often matters is the result, not so much the narratives behind the result. López’s work upends this outlook with pieces that are equal parts hypnotic and gorgeous, conceptual and cerebral.

There are narratives within her work, ancestral and cultural, that pull both from history and her own life. Using both natural and man-made materials, as well as harnessing both her weaving and metallurgical fabrication, López crafts one-of-a-kind pieces that traverse the line between fine art and high fashion.

“When I came to live in San Diego, I began to work at the Mingei (International Museum), and that definitely led me to think about my own work and reflect,” López recalled. “I began to think about how it was presented, these functional objects. There’s often this disconnection between the maker and the viewer. You put something on the wall and there’s this disconnection between them and how it was made.”

López will return to the Mingei later this month for “La Frontera,” an ambitious group exhibition that features more than 85 contemporary jewelers whose work explores the myriad complexities of the Mexico/U.S. border. The traveling exhibition at Mingei opens January 27 and runs through August 4, and will be held in conjunction with a concurrent exhibition at CECUT-Centro Cultural Tijuana (opening February 6).

For the exhibition, López is producing a series of “souvenir”-style postcards that include a small pin or brooch with the text “greetings from …” playfully written above the pin. Again, while these works seem waggish on the surface, López pointed out that it deals in themes of “questioning language and place” and the “erased histories” of the San Diego/Tijuana region.

“Greetings from Otay Mesa” by San Diego artist Maru Lopez.

(Courtesy of Maru Lopez)

For example, a piece that is devoted to La Jolla examines the origins of the name of the neighborhood. Whereas most would assert that “La Jolla” simply means “the jewel” in Spanish, the name might actually originate from an incorrect transcription when Spanish colonizers took the Kumeyaay natives’ name for the area (which translated to “cave” or “hole”) and interpreted it as “jewel.”

“It has this lineage and it’s because the Kumeyaay called it the land of caves,” López said. “So it’s thinking about that and the piece uses objects related to that.”

Later in 2024, López will be participating in a group exhibition with a four-member collective of Latin American/Latinx jewelers (Colectiva Tilde). The exhibition is meant to coincide with the Society of North American Goldsmiths conference in June, as well as the events surrounding San Diego/Tijuana’s recent World Design Capital distinction.

“Toda la Vida,” a jewlery piece by San Diego artist Maru Lopez.

(Courtesy of Maru Lopez)

“If I had not learned what I learned here, I don’t think I’d be making the type of work I’m making,” she said. “It’s the region, living near the border, these things have influenced me. Living here makes me think about my home, but it also makes me think about my relationship with the United States. I don’t think I would have returned to thinking about those things if I wasn’t here in San Diego.”

“Maybe I’m at a moment where I can finally see that,” she addd later. “That place where I can step back and acknowledge that I’ve always been doing this kind of work but now I can do it more consciously. I can see it more clearly.”

Name: Maru López

Born: San Juan, Puerto Rico

Fun Fact: While studying contemporary jewelry design at the Alchimia Contemporary Jewellery School in Firenze, Italy, López says she was often encouraged to take a more “minimalist” approach to her work, but adds that her “punk rock mindset” always had her reverting back to her own designs.

‘La Frontera’

When: Opens Jan. 27 and runs through Aug. 4 (a sister exhibit runs Feb. 6-June 9 at CECUT-Centro Cultural Tijuana)

Where: 1439 El Prado, Balboa Park, San Diego

Admission: Free to $15

Online: mingei.org

Combs is a freelance writer.