Bryan Watai, Bobbi Caputo, Dot Uchima and Chelsey Dickson played important roles in creating the Malama Honua Quilt Project. Additional participants not pictured here are Wendi Roehrig, Janice Gail, Edith Kawai and Nancy Botticelli. (PHOTO BY GEORGE FULLER SPECIAL TO NORTH HAWAII NEWS) Quilts are a symbol of many hands working together to create beauty, warmth, maps to freedom and stories of time and place. A new quilt, created in support of the World Wide Voyage, “Mālama Honua” (help the earth) tells the mālama honua stories of seven local artists.
The idea for the Mālama Honua Quilt Project started with small flags made by the children who welcomed the Hōkūleʽa voyaging canoe into Hilo Harbor. “One of their projects with the community when they come into port is to have these peace flags. When they first did their sail around Hawai'i, they stopped in Hilo and my children participated in making the flags and they had a line they hung them all up on. Some of the communities patched together the peace flags and made quilts. That's where the idea came from,” says Chelsey Dickson, project navigator.
Sponsored by the Hawaiian Civic Club, Waimea and in collaboration with Topstitch, Dickson created kits containing a piece of fabric, an embroidery circle and a description of what it means to “malama honua”.
“I created the kits and I took them to artists so our community can create something beautiful with the intention of spreading the word to take care of our earth and support the message of the World Wide Voyage,” says Dickson.
Seven artists, Wendi Roehrig, Bryan Watai, Bobbi Caputo, Dot Uchima, Janice Gail, Edith Kawai and one farmer, Nancy Botticelli, told their malama honua stories by creating quilt panels. The panels were then taken to Liz Moiha at Topstitch who put them together to finish the quilt.
“I took all the pieces and the descriptions to Liz and laid them out. She came up with different types of fabrics. Some of them looked like the ocean or looked like the colors of the sky,” says Dickson.
Roehrig’s story tells of a long connection to Kīholo and its restoration. “Taking care of the planet, my first thought goes to Kīholo because we have been working on the fish pond restoration for a couple of years. That’s why I had the hands scooping up all the junk and showing the life coming out. One time we did actually scoop a bunch of that junk out with our hands,” says Roehrig.
Bryan Watai grew up in Waimea and spent many childhood hours roaming Waipi'o Valley. His panel tells the story of taro cultivation and the traditional sustainable practices used by the ancestors who, “Cultivated taro without destroying the land. The Hawaiians used the water source to go through the land and feed the plants and then released it to return to the ocean,” says Watai.
When Bobbi Caputo was invited to participate, she felt acknowledged for her art. It became a “learning point” about giving back or the passing “from one hand to another”, that she depicted in her mālama honua panel. “What we take from the land, we give back. What we take from one generation, we give back. It goes on and on,” says Caputo.
Hawai’i Civic Club member, Dot Uchima, chose to do a panel with a petroglyph family working together. “If families work together to mālama honua, if that can happen, what a better world we’d be in,” said Uchima. Her other panel depicts Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa with Makali’i glittering in the background. “Makali’i is made up of Hawai'iloa (first to arrive) and his navigators. Their resources and their lifestyle is something we can hope to become and the mountains protect and sustain us,” says Uchima.
Hōkūle`a is shown sailing among the continents and nations in Janice Gail’s piece Many Nations, One Planet: A Universal Responsibility. “I mālama honua by recycling and repurposing everything possible and strive not to waste,” says Gail.
Edith Kawai’s panel is about alignment with the earth’s piko (umbilical) and mindfulness. It’s a view looking up into the earth’s piko, symbolizing the need to conserve the earth’s resources. “I am mindful of water usage, use solar energy and cut down on petroleum fuel and electricity,” says Kawai.
The Mālama Honua Quilt will perhaps inspire more efforts to raise awareness. “I wanted to bring people together to create an inspirational piece to show the community. I’m so thankful for the people involved and the idea and the mission behind it,” says Dickson.
Like Makaliʽi magic, the Mālama Honua Quilt, currently on display at Kahilu Theatre in the large gallery, is an example of what can be done when people work together towards a common vision.
The idea for the Mālama Honua Quilt Project started with small flags made by the children who welcomed the Hōkūleʽa voyaging canoe into Hilo Harbor. “One of their projects with the community when they come into port is to have these peace flags. When they first did their sail around Hawai'i, they stopped in Hilo and my children participated in making the flags and they had a line they hung them all up on. Some of the communities patched together the peace flags and made quilts. That's where the idea came from,” says Chelsey Dickson, project navigator.
Sponsored by the Hawaiian Civic Club, Waimea and in collaboration with Topstitch, Dickson created kits containing a piece of fabric, an embroidery circle and a description of what it means to “malama honua”.
“I created the kits and I took them to artists so our community can create something beautiful with the intention of spreading the word to take care of our earth and support the message of the World Wide Voyage,” says Dickson.
Seven artists, Wendi Roehrig, Bryan Watai, Bobbi Caputo, Dot Uchima, Janice Gail, Edith Kawai and one farmer, Nancy Botticelli, told their malama honua stories by creating quilt panels. The panels were then taken to Liz Moiha at Topstitch who put them together to finish the quilt.
“I took all the pieces and the descriptions to Liz and laid them out. She came up with different types of fabrics. Some of them looked like the ocean or looked like the colors of the sky,” says Dickson.
Roehrig’s story tells of a long connection to Kīholo and its restoration. “Taking care of the planet, my first thought goes to Kīholo because we have been working on the fish pond restoration for a couple of years. That’s why I had the hands scooping up all the junk and showing the life coming out. One time we did actually scoop a bunch of that junk out with our hands,” says Roehrig.
Bryan Watai grew up in Waimea and spent many childhood hours roaming Waipi'o Valley. His panel tells the story of taro cultivation and the traditional sustainable practices used by the ancestors who, “Cultivated taro without destroying the land. The Hawaiians used the water source to go through the land and feed the plants and then released it to return to the ocean,” says Watai.
When Bobbi Caputo was invited to participate, she felt acknowledged for her art. It became a “learning point” about giving back or the passing “from one hand to another”, that she depicted in her mālama honua panel. “What we take from the land, we give back. What we take from one generation, we give back. It goes on and on,” says Caputo.
Hawai’i Civic Club member, Dot Uchima, chose to do a panel with a petroglyph family working together. “If families work together to mālama honua, if that can happen, what a better world we’d be in,” said Uchima. Her other panel depicts Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa with Makali’i glittering in the background. “Makali’i is made up of Hawai'iloa (first to arrive) and his navigators. Their resources and their lifestyle is something we can hope to become and the mountains protect and sustain us,” says Uchima.
Hōkūle`a is shown sailing among the continents and nations in Janice Gail’s piece Many Nations, One Planet: A Universal Responsibility. “I mālama honua by recycling and repurposing everything possible and strive not to waste,” says Gail.
Edith Kawai’s panel is about alignment with the earth’s piko (umbilical) and mindfulness. It’s a view looking up into the earth’s piko, symbolizing the need to conserve the earth’s resources. “I am mindful of water usage, use solar energy and cut down on petroleum fuel and electricity,” says Kawai.
The Mālama Honua Quilt will perhaps inspire more efforts to raise awareness. “I wanted to bring people together to create an inspirational piece to show the community. I’m so thankful for the people involved and the idea and the mission behind it,” says Dickson.
Like Makaliʽi magic, the Mālama Honua Quilt, currently on display at Kahilu Theatre in the large gallery, is an example of what can be done when people work together towards a common vision.
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