This Small Town on Maui is Being Revitalized by Public Art During COVID

SMALL TOWN * BIG ART (ST*BA) is proud to announce its first public artwork since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Entitled “Ma kāhi o ka hana he ola malaila (where work is, there is life),” a large-scale mural (94 feet wide x 30 feet long) celebrating diversity and inclusion has been hand-painted on the Main Street Promenade in Wailuku - the seat of Maui County, Hawaiʻi - by artist Eric Okdeh.

A seven-month, COVID-19-spurred hiatus nearly broke the momentum of the two-year ST*BA pilot project; an NEA-funded initiative to revitalize a town of enormous cultural significance through collaborative, public art. But with a community now feeling heard as their history, culture and shared stories have come to life through exceptional visual and performing artists, the demand for collective creativity made way for the return of this visiting artist to Wailuku.

Philadelphia-based Eric Okdeh began creating public art in 1998. After receiving his BFA in painting from Tyler School of Art, he chose to focus on socially engaged public art exclusively. Using art as a means to gather personal narratives, he excels at bringing people’s stories to life to create a dialogue that is cathartic and promotes empathy and understanding.

Known locally in Wailuku, HI as the artist behind the town’s first mural, the 2012 Nā Wai 'Ehā mural that was made possible through a collaboration between Hui Noʻeau Visual Arts Center, County of Maui and the Laila Twigg-Smith Art Fund of Hawaii Community Foundation, Okdeh is world-renowned for creating a framework for engagement that is central to the success of each project.

ST*BA’s Kelly McHugh-White, who was responsible for initially bringing the artist to Maui in 2012 shares, “I remember having to appeal to the Maui Redevelopment Agency and Wailuku Community Association during large, public meetings to allow public art. It was hard work, and I didn’t feel like I was making any progress - until I met Erin Wade from the County’s Planning Department. Her passion and professionalism is what ultimately made it work, and we didn’t stop until we were able to create this project together now - 8 years later - to bring Eric back as an exemplary model of community-based arts development that is now leading us into a new future for the program.”

The ST*BA request-for-proposals - which has now yielded 9 groundbreaking works of public art throughout the historic town, as well as derivative projects, called for exceptional quality, style, experience in creating communal or public art, significance to Wailuku and alignment with an ʻōlelo noʻeau (Hawaiian proverb, selected from a collection that was translated and annotated by Mary Kawena Pūkuʻi), selected in collaboration with Sissy Lake-Farm, Director of Hale Hōʻikeʻike at the Bailey House Museum/ Maui Historical Society. Okdeh ultimately named his piece for the proverb that was selected to inspire community participation in its development: Ma kāhi o ka hana he ola malaila (where work is, there is life). The artist spent 15 days painting the mural after several weeks immersed in virtual conversations with the project team and Wailuku residents.

Mural elements include visions of past and present Wailuku arts memories and influences, displayed on a billowing purple kimono being created by a teacher and her student from the 1911 Kanda Home in Wailuku, which was a boarding school for "unfortunate Japanese girls." Images include the St. Anthony Boys' School Band of the 1950s with conductor Walter Garcia; Aunty Emma Sharpe, who taught hula classes in Wailuku; Hawaiian Music Icon Willie K; the Philippine tinikling dance - done between bayuhan, wooden pestles used to pound husks off of rice grain; Maui Chamber Orchestra; Maui Academy of Performing Arts and more, with art forms based in Japanese, Portuguese, Filipino and Hawaiian cultures. Together, the piece speaks to Wailuku as the hub of migration and multiculturalism that has given us so many chapters of artistic flavor since memory and available archives serve.

Led by Lake-Farm, who additionally serves as a core ST*BA collaborator as well as a Kumu hula, a small, socially-distanced blessing was held during the artist’s final day on Island, and attended by Wailuku community members that went above and beyond in sharing their mana'o (ideas and knowledge) with the program team in order to portray an accurate and inspiring tribute to Wailuku arts and culture.

"As the blessing was underway, I took a look around me at some of the people who helped contribute to this project," shares Okdeh, "The people around me helped craft this vision over a period of two weeks. It was a relief and an honor to learn that everyone felt that I had done justice to our conversations in the design. They can find elements of what they contributed in words and photographs in the mural before them."

“Working with Hale Hōʻikeʻike through Sissy’s extraordinary expertise has offered so many essential elements to this project,” shares McHugh-White, “from identifying and coordinating advisers on the very specific subject matter to directing us through their extensive archives over dozens of hours, Sissy and her organization are critical to the accuracy and intensity of both Eric’s piece and of SMALL TOWN * BIG ART. Together with Erin Wade, the three of us comprise the ST*BA team, and we are so thankful to have met and created this movement.”

ABOUT ST*BA: Launched in 2018, the goal of SMALL TOWN * BIG ART is to help position Wailuku as a public arts district that is focused on its very distinctive sense of place, history and culture. Each art installation is led by professional artists that have submitted project applications exhibiting exceptional quality, style, experience in creating communal or public art, significance to Wailuku and alignment with a selected ʻōlelo noʻeau. 51 artist proposals were panel-reviewed in February 2019; 13 of which were selected to participate in a communal process of research, development, and implementation of a final piece. 9 have been completed to date, with 4 to complete by the end of 2020.

ABOUT WAILUKU: Maui County’s downtown Wailuku is the gateway to the enormously significant ‘Īao Valley, with historic plantation-era and art deco architecture framed by the green backdrop of the West Maui Mountains (Mauna Kahālāwai). Ancient Hawaiʻi’s center of power and population, Wailuku became a culturally diverse locus of commerce when thousands immigrated from Asia, Europe, and America to work the plantations. With the decline of the sugar industry in the 1960s, Wailuku became blighted. Within the last decade, the town has inched toward revival with a handful of local eateries and an army of creatives inspired to reimagine Wailuku. In 2012, project "reWailuku" began, inviting the community to explore options for public spaces, and capturing the public’s vision for the future of Wailuku. As of 2018, the County is implementing a three-phase redevelopment project to rejuvenate the downtown as a cultural district. Concurrently, the County's NEA-funded grant project, SMALL TOWN * BIG ART is being conducted over three phases between 2018-2020.

SMALL TOWN * BIG ART
1935 Main St #204, Wailuku, HI 96793
Kelly McHugh-White
kelly@kellymchugh.org

A collaboration of the National Endowment for the Arts, County of Maui and Hale Hōʻikeʻike at the Bailey House/ Maui Historical Society, SMALL TOWN * BIG ART is a creative placemaking program with a mission to develop Wailuku, Hawaiʻi as a public arts district that is focused on its distinctive sense of place, history and culture.

Engaging the public in both the process and the product, monthly art experiences are paired with activities such as talk story sessions, artist workshops, public rehearsals and more. Each art installation is led by professional artists that have submitted project applications exhibiting exceptional quality, style, experience in creating communal or public art, significance to Wailuku and alignment with a selected ʻōlelo noʻeau. Through many hands and many voices, these creative interpretations represent a revitalized identity for this small town with the BIGGEST heart.

This release was published on openPR.