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Site: 7

Koko Crater Botanical Garden

Phase 2: Now Open

Photographic Installation

Title

Ku‘u Pua i Kohelepelepe

(2025)

Artist(s)

Ualani Davis

Collaborators

Ka‘imina‘auao Kahikina

Site: 7

Koko Crater Botanical Garden

Phase 2: Now Open

Photographic Installation

Title

Ku‘u Pua i Kohelepelepe

(2025)

Artist(s)

Ualani Davis

Collaborators

Ka‘imina‘auao Kahikina

Ku‘u Pua i Kohelepelepe

(2025)

This series of cyanotypes inspired by “Ku‘u Pua i Paoakalani,” a song by Queen Lili‘uokalani referencing Paoakalani, her personal garden, and Uluhaimalama, a kū‘oko‘a (independence) garden planted for the people after the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom. Documenting plants significant to these gardens (koa and kukui) and to Maunalua (‘ihi‘ihilauākea), Ualani reimagines the botanical garden as a garden of resistance. The installation casts shifting blue shadows of the images commemorating three historic days of Hawaiian resistance and celebration.

 

niho or down
niho or down
Image of Artist Ualani Davis

Ualani Davis

Ualani Davis is a Native Hawaiian artist and art educator from Honolulu, Hawaiʻi who often works with photography and mixed-media to investigate facets of identity, ancestry, and culture.   As an indigenous artist, she is especially fascinated by photography’s historical influence on the creation and spread of indigenous identity amongst the rest of the world.  Ualani uses her artistic practice as a way to visually explore and express her experience as a Native Hawaiian, contemporary artist, teacher, daughter, and woman.

Ualani received a BFA from the University of Hawaiʻi at Manoa and a MA in Art Education from Boston University.  She currently teaches high school photography at Kamehameha Schools Kapālama in the Visual Arts Department.

Photos: Lila Lee

Koko Crater Botanical Garden