Exploring personal and collective community experiences, artists Wendy Kawabata and Vincent Goudreau incorporate disparate sources to create unique maps. By merging the boundaries of several countries together, Kawabata's recent series of perforated maps explores the idea of belonging to more than one place as populations move and migrate. The corresponding image transfers depict stacks of benches representing the debris and bodies of knowledge left in the wake of these community movements. Goudreau's recent series of drawings were inspired by questioning the daily activities of people, communities and cities he observed during his world travels. Street maps, routes, symbols, blueprints, and diagrams are recombined to create ambiguous images which hint at new patterns of human organization.

The series, What She Took with Her, began when Laura Smith inherited a small old-fashioned suitcase from her parents. She muses, "I imagined it was the suitcase my mother took on her honeymoon." The resulting series of whimsical prints depict articles of clothing one would take on their honeymoon printed directly on maps of popular destinations.

Jinja Kim and Lori Uyehara use maps to comment on the fragile balance of the world we inhabit. Kim's small-scale sculptures support intricate surfaces that are layered with maps and collected materials. Her latest series of map covered foods and candy illustrate her words, "We are consuming the earth as if its resources are inexhaustible. We are overeating." Uyehara's mixed media sculptures and paintings invite the viewer to travel through Hawaii's changing landscapes and explore paths to its future. She says, "These works draw upon the diversity of the natural world and the complex relational systems that govern its evolution. They are visual discourses on the topics of interconnectedness, preservation, survival, and fragility."

The works of Abigail Lee Kahilikia Romanchak and Gaye Chan explore how maps divide and define, recording the constant shift of borders. Romanchak's Taxed series depicts various Tax Map Keys used for the property tax identification of Maui neighborhoods. This series comments on the shift of land division from the ancient Hawaiian ahupua'a system of mountains to ocean, to the system of Tax Maps used in Hawaii today. Chan's piece, On Mobility, is one of 54 digital images in the series and shows approximately 2 of the 1,951 miles of the US/Mexico border. To create this work Chan appropriated satellite images from Google maps and layered them in Photoshop onto scanned book pages with wormholes. On the computer she meticulously erased the areas on the map corresponding to the areas eaten away by the worms – resulting in irregular edges and missing information.

Known internationally for her work with maps, New York artist Joyce Kozloff created her two Voyages series during residencies at the Hui No'eau Visual Arts Center on Maui. Of her experience she says, "On my first day on Maui, I was taken to the local historical society where we found an old property map of the island from 1885. One could see how it had been divided into sugar and pineapple plantations, as well as the island's extraordinary topography. I appropriated this image, greatly enlarged, for my prints." On her second trip, Kozloff sketched a silhouette of Kaho'olawe from the vantage point of Upcountry Maui. Using this sketch as a point of departure, the second woodblock series includes a small etching on the bottom a view of Kaho'olawe from Maui layered under a U.S. government aerial chart.

Artist Biographies

Gaye Chan

Gaye Chan currently holds the position of Chair of the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Hawaii, Manoa. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Hawaii, Manoa, and her Master of Fine Arts from the San Francisco Art Institute. She has exhibited at Asia Society, New York, NY; the Honolulu Academy of Arts, Honolulu, HI; Art in General, New York, NY; YYZ, Toronto, Canada; Artspeak, Vancouver, Canada; Gallery 4A, Sydney, Australia; and SF Camerawork, San Francisco, CA. Chan is also an active participant of DownWind Productions, a collaborative that examines the impact of colonialism, capitalism, and tourism in Hawai'i.

Vincent Goudreau

Currently living in Haiku, Maui, Goudreau has taught video history and editing, as well as worked as a graphic designer, video producer and editor. His video work has been exhibited in the United States and abroad including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver, CO; Gallery Boreas, New York, NY; the Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum, Santa Barbara, CA; Furniture Works Gallery, London, England; and Anexo Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico. He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from the California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA.

Wendy Kawabata

Wendy Kawabata has been an Assistant Professor of Painting and Drawing at the University of Hawaii, Manoa since 2005. Her works have been exhibited in numerous gallery and museum exhibitions including Loyola University, Chicago, IL; Hera Gallery, Wakefield, RI; Rochester Contemporary Gallery, Rochester, NY; and Steps Gallery, Melbourne, Australia. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Massachusetts College of Art and her Master of Fine Arts from the University of New Mexico.

Jinja Kim

Jinja Kim earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts in painting from Ewha Woman 's University in Seoul, Korea and her Master of Fine Arts in printmaking from the University of Hawaii, Manoa. Recently her work has been included in the Shin Sa Im Dangl International Art Exhibition in Korea and at the Korean American Artists show at Chaney and Hallway Galleries in Annapolis, MD. Her artwork is in numerous national and international collections including the Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and the Arts; the City and County of Honolulu; the International Graphic Center, Venice, Italy; Bibliotheque Nationale de France; and Taidehlli Museum, Finland.

Joyce Kozloff

Joyce Kozloff has taught at several universities, including the Chicago Art Institute, the School of Visual Arts in New York, and Cooper Union in New York. Her work is included in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art, and the Museum of Modern Art. She has also received two grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and one grant from the Rockefeller Foundation. Joyce Kozloff earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in art education from the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh, and a Master of Fine Arts degree in painting from Columbia University. She lives in New York, NY.

Maya Portner

Maya Portner Maya Portner received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Washington University School of Art in St. Louis and her Master of Fine Arts from the University of Hawaii, Manoa. She studied at Haystack Mountain School of Craft in Deer Isle, Maine; and in Florence, Italy. Her works have been exhibited in Honolulu at Koa Gallery, The Arts at Mark's Garage, the University of Hawaii Art Gallery, and the Academy Art Center at Linekona. Her work is scheduled to be included in the Holland Paper Biennial in Rijswijk, Holland in 2008. She currently teaches fiber at the University of Hawaii, Manoa.

Abigail Lee Kahilikia Romanchak

Abigail Romanchak received her Bachelor of Fine Arts and Master of Fine Arts degrees from the University of Hawaii, Manoa. Her work was shown in the Indigenous Hawaiian Nation Art Exhibition, United Nations, New York; the University of New South Wales, Australia; and in Hawaii at the Arts at Marks Garage, Honolulu; Hui No'eau Visual Arts Center, Maui; and the Maui Arts and Cultural Center. Her work is in the collections of The Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and the Arts, as well as many corporate collections. She lives in Kula, Maui.

Laura Smith

Laura Smith is the Executive Director of the Honolulu Printmakers and co-founded the organization in 1987. She received her Bachelor of Arts in Art History from Wilson College, Pennsylvania and her Master of Fine Arts in printmaking from the University of Hawaii, Manoa. Her prints have been exhibited at the Honolulu Academy of Arts, Honolulu, HI; Tokyo, Japan; Richmond, VA; and Seoul, Korea.

Lori Uyehara

Lori Uyehara received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Hawaii, Manoa. Her works are in the collections of the Honolulu Academy of Arts, The Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and the Arts, and The Hawaii State Department of Education. She has exhibited in Hawaii at the Honolulu Academy of Arts; The Balcony Gallery, Kailua; Hawaii Pacific University Art Gallery, Kaneohe; Koa Gallery at Kapiolani Community College, Honolulu; and in California at the City of Brea Art Gallery. She lives in Honolulu.