“Hawaiian Star Compass — Mahalo Sea &Stars” opens Friday at Wailoa Center in Hilo.
This project is a performance installation featuring the shared voices of the Kula ‘Amakihi students from the Volcano School of Arts &Sciences.
The pop-up exhibit will be on display in the Education Lanai at Wailoa Center from Friday until March 27.
The multi-media exhibit will open with a parade, performances and introduction to the exhibit from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Friday.
This project focuses on topics of concern to students grades three through eight in response to ocean pollution, space pollution, coral bleaching, animal extinction and other challenges caused by human choices.
“The aim is to raise awareness and inspire a call to action so that we can stop this downward trend and begin to uphold our human roles and responsibilities in the interconnected web of life,” Barbara Sarbin, lead educator for the project, said in a press release.
The exhibit is a collaboration with the Native Skywatchers nonprofit, directed by artist and astrophysicist Annette Lee, and the Something Good in the World nonprofit for Kula ‘Amakihi, the community-based education program out of Volcano School of Arts &Sciences.
Native Skywatchers and Kula ‘Amakihi have been working together since 2020 to create experiential education at the intersection of science, art and culture.
This year, students were asked: “How do you mahalo (give thanks to) life through soundscape, whale song, the star compass, mo‘olelo and movement?”
The result is a fully immersive exhibit of two and three-dimensional artwork, videos, performance and installation art, all in celebration of the interconnectedness of all living things and our collective responsibility to malama ‘aina by finding solutions we can adopt our own lives.
Wailoa Center is under the Department of State Parks.
The center is free and open to the public during exhibits from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday-Friday, and from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays.
For more information,
call Wailoa Center at (808) 933-0416.
