Students have a hand in sculpture HANALEI – The morning showers passing through the campus of Hanalei School caused artist Kath McClelland Cowan to just draw the shawl tighter around her body as she supervised work on “Stories of Hanalei,”
Students have a hand in sculpture
HANALEI – The morning showers passing through the campus of Hanalei School caused artist Kath McClelland Cowan to just draw the shawl tighter around her body as she supervised work on “Stories of Hanalei,” the sculpture punctuating the landscape between the school’s cafeteria and the classrooms.
Like the big-wave spectacle that mesmerizes spectators each winter at Hanalei Bay, the dominant form of a wave cresting captures the eye of a school visitor. It also draws attention to the rainbow of tiles that connects ceramic characters common to the North Shore community.
McClelland Cowan is quick to express her joy with working with the school’s 250 students. Drawing on her experience of tilework at Kamalani Playground, she said each student was asked to create a tile for the school artwork that can be seen by motorists passing the school en route to points north.
Although the base foundation was laid in January, McClelland Cowan said conceptual work on the piece started long before the concrete trucks arrived to pour the base from which the wave crests.
Riding the crest amidst a rainbow of colored tiles are the assorted ceramic characters created by the students which will live in the wave long after the pupils have left the school on their various life paths.
This theme was reinforced as work stopped while the school paid tribute last Tuesday to visiting Baltimore Ravens quarterback Trent Dilfer, who spent some time as a visitor in Hanalei as a teenager.
McClelland Cowan watched as the star of the Super Bowl champion Ravens, who was on Kaua’i last week for the National Football League Quarterback Challenge, fielded questions from students and school staff members.
McClelland Cowan’s project is funded through the Art in Public Places program administered by the state Foundation for Culture and the Arts, One Per Cent for the Arts. Under this program, 1 percent of a public construction project’s cost is allocated to fund a piece of artwork for patrons’ appreciation once the project is complete. Similar projects have been funded at Kaua’i Community College and Kapa’a High School, and more are earmarked for other campuses, such as Kalaheo School.
“Stories of Hanalei” will be dedicated on March 9, with ceremonies getting at 10 a.m.
TGI photographer Dennis Fujimoto can be reached at 245-3681, ext 253.
