BURGER KING’S CANOE PAINTING

Posted on September 30, 2007

I wonder what ever happened to the very large painting of Herb Kane that was hanging on the walls of the former Burger King,  corner Dillingham and Kings street in Honolulu ? The size of that painting must have been approximately 5′ x 15 feet . Someone mentioned to me that it must have been a reproduction. I doubt very much that anybody would have gone throught the trouble of reproducing a painting to this size. I believe that it was the original painting illustrated in VOYAGERS by Herb Kawainui Kane, entitled Canoe Race and credited to Pentagram Corporation Collection. Can anybody tell me about the whereabout of that painting ?

The deck

Posted on September 30, 2007

That the Polynesians were capable to make wood planks is a fact they demonstrated very early on by adding a plank of wood on both sides of their canoe to make them more sea worthy and prevent waves splashing in. Those planks are called wash-strakes or gunnels, or also rims. In most instances, the Hawaiian used Ahakea wood for those wash-strakes. But fishing canoes like the Opelu type canoe were relatively small, maybe no more than 20 feet in lenght.  This compares very badly with the lenght of ocean going voyaging canoes or those King Kamehameha war canoes , which were anything between 60 to 90 feet long. Its at this point that I have a contention regarding “nice cut planks of wood” forming the deck of those vessels. Also, lets look at the choice of tools available to ancient Polynesian people, a choice that has been well documented. To follow.

The deck

Posted on September 30, 2007

When ever I work on a model, especially a Polynesian type one, it always puzzles me how the ancient Hawaiian or Marquesan, those seem to be the one who did build the longest voyaging canoes, constructed the deck of their canoes, in particular the planking of the deck. Old black and white photos like those in the volumes of Hadden & Hornell do not reveal much. The all inspiring paintings by Herb Kawainui Kane show most voyaging canoes covered with very long and well sawn planks lashed onto the beams of the canoe. I am not one to say that the Hawaiian or the Marquesans may not have known how to cut logs of wood into planks. After all the Egyptiens and the Incas knew how to build huge pyramids thousands of years ago and we still have not yet figured out how they could move the huge rocks needed to build those monuments. My doubt is more about availibility of material rather than whether the Polynesians were able to split logs into planks, which in my opinion they actually were capable of doing. To follow.

Nguzu-nguzu or toto-isu

Posted on September 27, 2007

Which is an anthropomorphic canoe prow figurehead guiding the boat and protect its crew. There is a wonderful work written by Deborah Waite from Hawaii, on google.com about Toto-Isu and the link is :www.tribalarts.com/feature/solomon/index.html. Anyway I had to carve one more of those Toto-isu in miniature and I was very pleased with it. Last time it took me a few trials to get one properly done

John Gonczar

Posted on September 27, 2007

Posted on September 27, 2007
My good friend John. I really do miss him. I miss the always interesting talks I had with him regarding woodworking and politics. John was the owner of Waiawa Woods in Waipio Gentry Industrial Center, and in my opinion one of the very best high end furniture maker on the islands. John’s shop was where many other good furniture makers came to chat, exchange ideas, or have them sand some pieces of wood on his wide belt sander or resaw Koa for guitar making. John had all the tools and machinery every hobby and professional woodworker dreams about, from the 36″ band saw driven by a 10 HP motor, to the very big Powermatic scrollsaw and the cyclone dust collector. As one can imagine by now, John shop was always spotless and whenever you entered the shop you could smell the fragrance of Sugi Pine or camphor wood and spot somewhere on a working bench some beautifully carved pineapples that will end up decorating some bed posts. John’s work was fairly fast and always very precise and sometimes I wondered, with all those people coming to pay him visits, how he finds the time to finish his projects. John was really liked because contrary to many other artisans, he loved sharing ideas and experience, even wood if you needed some, and never ever gave you the impression to know more than you do. John moved to the West coast a few years ago with his family, and today, same as I do every few months, I called John and like usual, had a fantastic talk, covering topics like woodworking, family, politics etc. Just like in the old days. John’s daughter is already 10, a fourth grader. I remember John’s joy the day she was born. And now, when I drive past John’s old workshop where there used to be the sign WAIAWA the WOODWORKS, I always catch a pinch of camphor and sugi pine scent in my memory. Take care, John.

My favorite USPS office

Posted on September 22, 2007

Second or third time I write about the USPS. Must be important, Yes it is, it is the lifeline from here all the way to my customer, so yes, the Postal Service is important to me. And you know what ? I should, any customer should be important to them, but this is not always the feeling you get from them. And it annoys me to be asked those seven famous questions like :-

-Do you want to paid credit card or check ?

-Would you like any cash back ?

-Do you need any stamps ?

 Bla bla bla

_Anything else ?….

YES: DON’T MAKE ME QUEUE UP FOR 30 MINUTES AND IF I WANT SOMETHING ELSE, I WILL TELL YOU. RIGHT NOW I WANT TO GO OUT OF HERE, ILLICO PRESTO. I LOST ENOUGH TIME ALREADY.

 The Mililani Post Office , here on Oahu, is the worst. I saw that clerk spending exactly 15 minutes with a lady who wanted a special $ 0.25 cents stamp.. She must have liked him or vice versa, but anyway speak about profitability….

 The time it takes one to be served at the Mililani Post Office is sufficient for anybody to drive down to the Airport post office where the service is highly professional, fast, and always courteous. I really like those guys and ladies down there, they are always smiling, helpful, they may ask the stupid seven questions, but in fast sequence without expecting any answers, in fact they try to do their job without making you loose patience and time. And most of all none of the clerks there is trying to show off to ladies…….

The little round woodstove.

Posted on September 20, 2007

I liked to climb onto the little bench and look out the window of the small woodworking shop of my Dad. On that day the garden was blanketed with snow and the wind was blowing and whistling. It was winter. Right behind me, to my right, there was the little stove to warm up the room. My duty was to take care that the stove had always fuel, in other words wood to burn. There were plenty offcut pieces but I like to feed the stove with those very long woodshaving my Dad made with his hand planer and I clearly remember having been fascinated by the fact that some shaving, and some other coming from a different species of wood, burned differently. My dad was planing and shaving some pieces of acacia to make oxcart wheels. This really was his specialty and I wonder where the easel went and all the drawknifes he used for carving the wheels spokes. But what I like to remember most, and this is something that stood with me for ever, is the beautiful smell of pinewood or oak. Till today I cannot touch pine or oak wihtout having to think at my Dad in his woodworking shop. Something else reminds me of those days with my Dad; the smell of cold smoking sausages or ham in most houses of the village, and the song of the cuckoo in the forest near by. My Dad was a very patient person, never ever raising his voice and always happy to help and explain. I always knew that I ow my skill to my Dad but he knew how to work with both wood and metal whereby I never likes metal work. How would they say in this country ?…My Dad was my hero. Yes I always, always looked up to him and always paid great respect.

Ready for sale

Posted on September 20, 2007

On a previous post I was talking about putting the finishing touches onto a  24″ Salomon islands canoe model . One can see an illustration of it prior of staining the wood.

The illustrated model hierby is that same model, ready for sale. Actually it was a commissioned piece, but I took the opportunity of having this model to place it as an exhibition piece at the 2007 Hawaiian Woodshow. Most people were intrigued by the intricate and very precise inlay work ,which is entirely hand crafted. Since the canoe model hull is concave and relatively small, it is impossible to carve the negatives for the inlay with a router or other type of small electrical machine. All I used were small chisels.

Creativity or inspiration

Posted on September 19, 2007

Has it ever happened to you, when doing some carving, painting , even writing, that things flow just naturally in your mind or that your fingers do really what your mind wanted them to create.? I mean like the perfect brush stroke on a painting ? And it leaves you with awe at what you have just done so perfectly. It makes oneself very happy, extremely proud and somewhat amazed.

This happened to me a few days ago when carving an identical pair of what I call the funny faces of a Salomon Islands canoe, better known as nguzu-nguzu. I drew their profile onto the wood and cut them out to shape and sand. Wow..perfect. I was amazed.

Now, 2 days later I wanted to replicate those same funny faces and how come I could not do this anymore  ? I had to start 3 times until I got it more or less identical to the previous ones. It frustrated me and reminded me of something I read one day about the work of an artist painter “Its those first strokes that are the most inspiring”

Gallery Uwe Dost

Posted on September 18, 2007

Yesterday I got the sad news that Uwe Dost closed its gallery at the Hilton Hawaiian Village.  Nobody knows the whereabouts of Uwe and rumour has it that he moved to the mainland. Another very gifted woodworker leaving the islands for better pasture…

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