Red Road Mile 17 remembered

Many folks living now in Puna don't remember the red road from when it was actually paved in red cinder. I thought it would be fun to celebrate my many years of enjoyment at mile 17 by posting all the pictures I can find of my favorite painting spot, especially since recent road improvements have changed it radically. These older paintings show the mottled old road before they repaved it standard grey in 2000. If I wasn't careful, the road could end up looking like a big slab of bacon!!

A Small Protest

I had my back to the recent devastation at my favorite painting spot at Puna Coastal Road mile 17, minding my own business, painting a view of the ocean through the remaining stand of coconut palms. Along comes Kiki, owner of the beautiful BnB right nearby, and says "I am so glad you are painting those trees before they get bulldozed!" which practically gives me a heart attack. Why do they need to bulldoze these trees??? I thought they were widening the OTHER side of the road....

Turns out they need to fill in a deep lava tube pit on either side of the road at exactly the most exquisite spot for painting in all of Puna, if not the world. It seems that a bicyclist drove into the puka (hole) and died painfully and unnoticed for several days in August, and the county fears lawsuits if it should ever happen again.

Tuko and I stayed up late Tuesday night, painting fabric banners saying "spare these trees, we love them," and so on, and we went down to our spot close to midnight and tied them up by the light of her tiny blue Honda. The next day I heard from our friend Paul that he had set up a meeting with one of the job supervisors, Ben Ishii, on Thursday morning, to see if they could be less dozer-happy about the project. A group of us met with Ben under umbrellas in the dripping rain, to the deafening sound of a giant dozer pushing huge rocks around directly opposite our cherished trees. And sure enough, he was very pleasant and did intervene on behalf of some of the trees. So we won a small victory even though most of the road crew could not comprehend why anyone would care about a bunch of old palm trees, especially when they were just doing their job to make the road safer for people to drive on faster....




On a more cheerful note, we stayed open late at the gallery to celebrate "first Friday" and the opening of the "Trash Art Show" which is the big event of the year up the block at the East Hawai'i Cultural Center. Gail had spent the day at the gallery putting the finishing touches on her splendid new painting of a Hawaiian pa'u rider.

Red Road Redux

Tuko, Cosette and I have been slaving over our new ad for the Guest Informant, a fancy hardbound magazine which will be placed in upscale hotel rooms next year. So it was wonderfully refreshing to finally get back out on the road together to paint at my favorite location, mile 17. I am so lucky to have such an amazing beauty spot so close to my home. However, there are rumblings on the horizon of county road "improvements" scheduled to happen in this exact spot sometime soon, which are filling me with dread. The county is notoriously heavy-handed in its wielding of chainsaw and bulldozer.

A J at the Yuba

The Yuba River in California is heaven to a water-baby such as myself. You park near a pair of bridges that cross the gorge, and hike up a trail redolent with native manzanita, madrone, mesquite, laurel and live oak (watch out for the poison oak!) Then you pick a spot to lounge on the warm white rocks which seem carefully designed for human comfort, and plunge from time to time into the clear, brisk green water burbling by in swift waterfalls and large deep ponds.

My Summer Travels

Here are some pictures from my vacation on the mainland. We drove from Seattle to New York with Richard's magnificent jock friend Russell who participated in both the gay games in Chicago and the Out Games in Montreal. These pics are from the last week of my trip when Bob and John invited me to a retreat in the mountains on Echo Lake, near Tahoe.

Gallery Thursday

Just another perfect day at the gallery...

When people come into our gallery one of the first things they notice is our floor. Before we opened exactly one year ago this month (our "soft" opening) we spent a few days working on the concrete "tiles", making patterns on each square, a lot of work but a lot of fun and the end result was another artistic way to 'dress up" the floor.

Busy Friday

It was First Friday, there were two openings in town and we had to get a window display ready for the Hawaii's World Heritage Festival window display competition. Kathleen Kam brought in an amazing Chinese dragon, lanterns and Indonesian puppets, Gail brought in cool Fijian art and tapa cloth, Cosette brought in masks from Thailand and I brought my giant Japanese doll.

Arthur Johnsen Gallery in Hilo

We are located in beautiful downtown Hilo on the Big Island of Hawai'i.
We are planning to be open for First Friday, next week on August 4th. First Friday is a monthly arts event where galleries throughout Hilo stay open in the evening and invite the community to come in and see our latest works, share pupus (snacks) and talk story with the artists. If you're nearby join us for First Friday. Call 808-935-8020 with questions and for directions. We'll even give directions from the mainland. Visit our website: arthurjohnsengallery.com.

The Happy Show

Last night was the opening for Gail's Happy Show. Originally meant to be about her dog, Happy, which I think would have been a cool show, but it got modified to whatever makes you happy. The show was at the Wailoa Center. The Arthur Johnsen Gallery had good representation, thanks to our connection with Gail. Unfortunately, my photos aren't the best, one because I don't have a great camera to start with and two, the flash stopped working. So my apologies for the photos that I didn't get due to technical difficulties. Gail, I love your Dog Time oil painting!

Fun in the Studio

My friend and frequent model Poni came by for a portrait this morning. She is extremely pregnant and it was nice to paint her in full glow. She made lei to wear in the picture and to give to Richard Koob later for his birthday. Hau'oli La Hanau, Richard!!



Coincidentally I had just sent another painting of Poni in to Gail's upcoming show at the Wailoa Center, "The Art of Happiness" which is an appropriate theme since Gail is one of the most adept folks I know at generating happiness all around her. I called this painting "Ka La Hau'oli" -- the happy day, since Poni looks fairly pleased.





Some friends sent me this pic of me tormenting my cat Tiny, and of their son Danny bouncing in the studio.

Modern Postcards emailed me an offer for 20% off on their printing services. So I hemmed and hawed and approached my wonderful graphic designer cousin Cherry about doing a rack card for the gallery, but then too much time passed and I had to whip it out myself. I incorporated a multicolored version of our "Gallery" banner which hangs on the awning outside, plus images from most of our artists....




I am hoping this card will jump out at people from racks at the Hilo dock and at various hotels, etc!!