"Io" by Kauanoe Chang, director of HOEA. Photo courtesy HOEA

Hawaiian 'Ohana for Education in the Arts, a project whose time has come

Pāheona / Fine Arts

By Kauanoe Chang / HOEA Project Director

It started as a dream of Keomailani Hanapi Foundation President Hiko'ula Hanapi many years ago. It started to re-emerge when KHF sponsored and the Office of Hawaiian Affairs assisted with funding for PIKO, a gathering of over 100 indigenous visual artists during the summer of 2007. At the gathering, Steve Gibbs, an artist and lecturer from New Zealand openly expressed his dismay at finding that local support for Hawaiian art was 25 years behind in developing. Many of the gathering's participants concurred. It presented a challenge for Hanapi, who eventually led a team to write a grant proposal to start a school of fine arts for emerging Native Hawaiian artists.

In September of 2008, the Keomailani Hanapi Foundation received a federal grant from the Administration for Native Americans to pilot a Native Hawaiian school of fine arts in Waimea, South Kohala, Hawai'i. Now, six months later, it is preparing to open its doors on May 25, 2009.

Kapa by Marie McDonald, one of the instructors at HOEA this year. Photo courtesy HOEA

The PIKO Gathering proved to be a fertile ground for identifying master Hawaiian and indigenous artists in various media: drawing and painting, printmaking, wood and stone carving, jewelry-making, glass art, fiber art, feather work, and kapa-making. When Hanapi learned of the ANA grant award, he returned to that fertile ground to hire master artists for HOEA's groundbreaking first year.

HOEA's Studio Program will consist of two contemporary visual art courses and two traditional art courses. Stacey Gordine from New Zealand will teach the jewelry-making class. Hawaiian artists will teach the other courses. Woodturning will be taught by the father and son team of Solomon Apio and Alani Apio; Hawaiian pahu carving by Kala Willis, and stone carving by Hanale Hopfe. Kapa masters will include the mother and daughter team of Marie McDonald and Roen Hufford, Sabra Kauka, Teresa Reveira, and Joni-Mae Makuakane-Jarrell.

These media were chosen because of their commercial potential for HOEA's students to become successful full-time artists or to supplement their incomes after they exit the program. It is also the hope of KHF and the HOEA staff that students will return to their home communities and homesteads to start cottage industries using the skills that they will have learned at HOEA, thus affecting the economy of those communities in positive ways.

Keomailani Hanapi Foundation President Hiko'ula Hanapi. - Photo courtesy HOEA

The Studio Program of classes will be augmented by two other components. The "Business of Art" workshops will teach students to develop art portfolios, and create awareness and understanding of business licenses, tax preparation, and presentation of art for exhibits and for sales. And a four-day HOEA Market event, scheduled for October 1-4, 2009, at the Waimea YMCA Town Hall and adjacent park, will allow students, emerging and master Hawaiian artists to exhibit and sell their artwork.

Those three components constitute an integrated system of art education which will address KHF's mission of "increasing the number, visibility, and accessibility to Native Hawaiian art and artists."

HOEA was chosen as the name for this KHF-ANA project because of its kaona. On one hand, hoea means "let's get started." And hō'ea means "to arrive." For Hanapi and KHF, it is both. The grant award marked the auspicious time for this brand new school for adult Native Hawaiian emerging artists to begin. The opening of its doors on May 25, 2009 on the grounds of Hawai'i Preparatory Academy, will herald HOEA's arrival and the realization of Hanapi's dream.

For more information about HOEA, visit khf-hoea.org.