Visual Arts
For a month or two this fall it is going to seem like fiber art 24/7 as numerous venues in Honolulu participate in an extensive array of exhibitions in conjunction with the international symposium of the Textile Society of America (TSA), being held here in late September. In addition to that substantial line-up, there is also a lot more going on in town during the coming season. –Marcia Morse
Honolulu Academy of Arts
At the Honolulu Academy of Arts, already replete with a series of selections of textile gems from China, Japan and Indonesia drawn from their own collection, look also for a major exhibition of painting by Japanese scholar-artists. Literati Modern: Bunjinga from late Edo to Twentieth-Century Japan, The Terry Welch Collection at the Honolulu Academy of Arts (Thu 9/11 to Sun 11/16) offers fresh views of work by artists in transition from tradition to modernity.
Academy’s Art Center at Linekona
Tattered Cultures: Mended Histories, at the Academy’s Art Center at Linekona, is one of the most conceptually complex of the TSA-related exhibitions, with an international roster of fiber artists who are TSA members, including Hawai’i’s own Maile Andrade, Marques Marzan and Wendy Kawabata. In the same venue, October begins with the Honolulu Printmakers’ biennial fundraising event, Prints 2008, on October 4–buy a ticket and go home with an original print at the end of food and music-filled evening. The Art Center galleries feature Anne Irons in a solo exhibition and the Hawaii Craftsmen’s Annual Exhibition (both run October 11-31.) After that, look for notice of the center’s annual World Art Bazaar, which opens the weekend just after Thanksgiving.
The Contemporary Museum
At The Contemporary Museum on Makiki Heights, puppets will be pulling all the strings for most of the fall–but a word to the wise: this is not necessarily an exhibition for young viewers. Later this season, Japan Fantastic opens on Sat 12/13 and continues into March of next year. In the meantime, look for Heavenly Garden, tattoo artist Mike Ledger’s mural on the museum cafe’s lana’i in an ongoing installation, and inside the cafe, Faces and Figures, an exhibition of works by local artists who work with the human figure as subject matter–the cafe show closes on Sun 9/28, so see it soon.
Hawai’i’s State Art Museum
Hawai’i’s State Art Museum (aka HiSAM) anchors one end of an increasingly vibrant downtown art scene that includes The Contemporary Museum at First Hawaiian Center (with a TSA-related invitational exhibition featuring fiber artists of Hawai’i and several galleries on Bethel, Nu’uanu, Smith and Hotel Streets in Chinatown, anchored by The ARTS at Marks Garage.) In addition to Intertwine, a selection of fiber art works from its collection, HiSAM is also featuring recently acquired works in other media in Accession; both exhibitions have just opened and continue into early 2009. Both exhibitions also serve as a valuable reminder of the Hawai’i State Foundation on Culture and the Arts’ program of acquiring art, primarily by island artists, for the public collection that belongs to all of us. HiSAM participates in First Fridays–10/3, 11/7 and 12/5–the monthly happening that is a major pau hana event in downtown and Chinatown when galleries, restaurants and other venues are open into the evening for browsing and general festivities–a testament to the city’s creative life.
