September 22, 2011, was a “singularly fascinating day”….. I mentioned this to my friend Doug Enderle in an email as he was part of the reason for the singularity of that day.
A singular experience is one like no other…it hasn’t happened before and likely won’t happen again, thus, it stands out in your mind with its own particular brilliance. It seems that recently, I have experienced a number of these ‘singular’ days. Is that possible? To have so many days that stand out as brightly as a handful of pearls, rubies and turquoise….each one stunning, eye catching and breathtaking?
On September 23 I was musing on these things and it occurred to me that the events of the 22nd, just about summed up my whole career in Kapa Making.
In the morning, I was scanning the tv and then the web, looking to see if a particular Good Morning America clip was being shown. I was in this clip, you see…it was filmed on Tuesday as a part of the press release/grand opening events for the new Aulani Disney Resort here on my side of the island of O`ahu. I had been asked to come and share about what I do because so much of my work is in the Resort and rendered in many different ways, from original kapa, to reproductions in the cast members uniforms and room décor, to the giant prints on textured vinyl that clothe part of the Maka’ala Lobby ceiling. I even have the wauke trees, or paper mulberry growing on the grounds and there is a set with kapa tools where, they sent one of my kapa beaters to Florida to have it reproduced in resin. It’s very lifelike! I wonder if it could pound.
Fortunately, one of my friends on Facebook found a link and posted it, so I could see my quick minute of GMA fame before I had to run out the door. In the clip, there is a brief interview with Joe Rohde, head of the Imagineering team who did all the creative planning on the resort. He and Jeanette Lomboy have been the champions of the use of art created by predominantly native Hawaiian artisians and which is seen throughout the resort. There is actually so much of this work that guests can take a curated walk-through just to see the art and learn about the Hawaiian culture through it. Then after Joe spoke, the reporter began to talk about kapa, and the words KAPA came up on the screen in big pink letters on top of a yellow lei. I was amazed to say the least, and then some shots of me doing what I do… scraping and pounding tree bark, and talking about it. It was quick, but my Mom saw it in San Diego, and some friends and family, and the rest could see the link. And yet what I remembered most was that giant KAPA on the screen. The reason for that became apparent.
As a kapa teacher, I was always asked the difference between kapa and tapa. Early on, I determined to create a difference in peoples minds between the two. As a visual learner, I know that when I think of tapa, I think of the south Pacific types of cloth…those from Tonga, Samoa and Fiji for example. I see the brown and black colors and the blocky prints and designs. And so when I talked about tapa and kapa, I would first tell everyone that tapa became a catch all word for the Polynesian barkcloth, but that each island had its own words to describe the cloth, plants and methods of production. Samoan barkcloth is called ‘siapo’ for instance, and that made in Tahiti is called ‘ahu’. I had learned from a Hawaiian Language and culture teacher once that in Hawaii, it might not have even been called kapa, since the word does not really ‘say’ what you are doing or what you have. It might have been called ‘pa`upa`u’, or known by the article of clothing you were making…the malo, pa`u or kihei. In any case, that had been my mission for the past 15 years and even on that day, sep. 22, later in the day actually, I had to explain to someone in a class about this difference.
But when I saw the kapa images from the Resort, and then the big word KAPA on the screen, and my hands scraping off the wauke bark, I realized that the images and the word had just been sealed into the minds of the viewing audience…that when people saw the word ‘kapa’ they would start to associate it with something definitive as a Hawaiian native art form. Talk about a ‘wow’ moment. For me, it really was, and it was like the culmination of one of my prime objectives of being a kumu kapa, or kapa teacher, and now Disney and GMA had just given me a big hand in that task. I was humbled to say the least.
Next, Part Two: Alpha
{rokintensedebate}