Letter From The Editor

As a curator, Isabella Ellaheh Hughes noticed something about people’s perceptions of Hawaiian art during her years working on the Mainland and internationally: Many people in the art world couldn’t name even one artist from Hawaii. To Hughes, who originally is from the Islands, this was troubling.

So she teamed up with Dr. KJ Baysa and Katherine Tuider to launch the Honolulu Biennial Foundation, which will host the first Honolulu Biennial visual arts festival next spring.

While the Honolulu Biennial still is a year away, they’re making it worth the wait with a whole bunch of exciting programming in the interim period. They just recently, for instance, kicked off an installation by famed Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama at Ward Village. You can check out the installation — a 15-piece sculpture called Footprints of Life — at the Ward Village Courtyard now. Plus, there’s a slew of community events to go along with the Kusama piece. (Even if Kusama’s name doesn’t ring a bell, you’ve probably seen her work — she’s the one behind that Infinity Mirrored Room that has got to be one of the most Instagrammed images ever.)

Kusama will be one of the artists displaying work in the Honolulu Biennial come 2017, and she’ll be joined by other international artists, alongside local ones.

We recently had the chance to chat with the Biennial organizers, check out the installation at Ward Village and learn more about Kusama. See the full story here.