Statue of Kamehameha I (Kapaau, Hawaii)
Statue of Kamehameha I | |
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Artist | Thomas Ridgeway Gould |
Completion date | 1880 1883 (installed) | (cast);
Medium | cast brass and painted with lifelike colors |
Subject | Kamehameha I |
Location | Kapaʻau, Hawaii |
The Kamehameha I statue (original cast) is an
Description
The Kamehameha I sculpture is an oversized painted brass casting of King Kamehameha I, the ruler credited with unifying the
Historical information
Commission and delivery to Hawaiʻi
The statue had its origins in 1878 when
By 1880, Gould finished the full-size plaster model for the work and sent it to the Barbedienne Foundry in Paris, France to be cast in brass. The finished brass sculpture was shipped[a] from Bremen, Germany in August 1880 en route to Hawaiʻi, but after encountering a storm in the south Atlantic, a fire broke out on deck and the ship sank near the Falkland Islands. Its entire cargo, including the sculpture, was presumed lost. When news of the shipwreck reached Honolulu, officials decided to commission a second cast using the $12,000 insurance collected after the loss of the original. Ironically, and unbeknownst to Honolulu officials, fishermen managed to recover the sunken statue, which was recognized and bought by a British ship captain[b] who then sold it in 1882 to the Hawaiian government for $875.[3][4] Now in possession of two identical statues, government officials decided to place the second cast, in considerably better condition than the original that had been damaged in the shipwreck, in the location originally intended to receive the statue, the Aliʻiōlani Hale government building in Honolulu. After some debate, the original was installed near Kamehameha I's birthplace in North Kohala. Due to the shipwreck, neither statue was on-hand in Hawaiʻi to fulfill Gibson's original plan of celebrating the 100th anniversary of Cook's arrival to the islands. However, Gibson was able to convince King Kalākaua to incorporate the unveiling of the Honolulu cast into his coronation ceremonies in February, 1883.[3][4]
Features
During the initial stages of the statue's design, Gould and Gibson made efforts to create an accurate likeness of King Kamehameha's face, body, and clothing. This proved to be a challenging task, as there was no consensus on what exactly Kamehameha I looked like. When in Boston, Gibson provided Gould with an engraving of King Kamehameha, a French copy of a Chinese copy of the king's official watercolor portrait by Russian artist Louis Choris in 1816.[5] Gibson directed Gould to use this copy of a copy of a copy, but to portray Kamehameha at approximately age forty-five, much younger than he appeared in the original watercolor. Attention was also focused on the proper way to depict Kamehameha's body; it was eventually determined that to convey his heroic and larger-than-life status, Kamehameha should be depicted with typical Herculean features, including a broad back and shoulders, strong, powerful arms, and a commanding chin.
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/eb/Statue-Augustus.jpg/200px-Statue-Augustus.jpg)
Some evidence exists to support the claim that Gould used the Roman sculpture of Augustus Caesar from Prima Porta (see Augustus of Prima Porta) as a model for Kamehameha the Great (original cast). The Augustus sculpture was well known throughout the United States and Europe at the time, and would most certainly have been known by Gould, whose neoclassical work was often inspired by Classical pieces. In addition, there are striking similarities between the Augustus of Prima Porta and Kamehameha the Great (original cast), including the raised right arm and the fact that Kamehameha holds his spear in his left hand like Augustus, even though Kamehameha was thought to have been right-handed.[6] It has been argued that this fusion of Hawaiian cultural attributes with Roman heroic imagery was a deliberate attempt to portray Kamehameha I as a “Pacific Hero” and bolster the Hawaiian monarchy at a time of political and economic instability.[7]
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f4/John_Tamatoa_Baker_modeling_as_Kamehameha_I%2C_composite_%28PP-67-8-013%29.jpg/200px-John_Tamatoa_Baker_modeling_as_Kamehameha_I%2C_composite_%28PP-67-8-013%29.jpg)
For use as reference for Gould, King
In order to deflect criticism from both American and Native Hawaiian opinion, Gould and Kalākaua made an effort to observe the many complex customs and ritualistic insignia needed to produce an accurate representation of a high-ranking Native Hawaiian chief. Still, some aspects of Kamehameha's depiction draw heavy criticism to this day. The main point of contention is the pair of sandals adorning Kamehameha's feet. While at the time, Hawaiians did wear sandals, it was only for traveling long distances or over heavy terrain, and the obviously Western Classical style of the shoes only compounds their inaccuracy.[23] Additional problems include the fact that Kamehameha's sash drags on the ground behind him like a royal European train (an arrangement that would be considered degrading by Native Hawaiians and that would also damage the delicate feathers composing the sash),[12][10] and Gould's decision to adorn the cloak with a European-style tassel. Although no early criticisms on the subject have been found, contemporary critics also take issue with Kamehameha's open-hand gesture, since traditional Hawaiian beckons are made with the palm down, not the palm up.[25]
Conservation history
Throughout its history, maintenance of the sculpture has proven to be challenging to carry out due to jurisdictional confusion—though the statue is located on county land, it is unclear if it belongs to the state or not, and therefore deciding who should be responsible for caring for it can be difficult to determine. Older residents of the island claim that during the plantation era, the sugar company bosses maintained the sculpture. Sometime after World War II, the County Department of Public Works in
In early 2001, Honolulu-contracted and the California-based conservator Glenn Wharton, who led an effort to conserve the statue. After helping to regild Kamehameha the Great (second cast) in 1994, Wharton visited the North Kohala statue in the spring of 1996 with the initial intent of determining and then restoring the statue to its original nineteenth-century appearance. Upon visiting the sculpture for the first time, Wharton discovered that the statue's current coat of paint had faded due to ultraviolet (UV) light from the Sun, was lifting in many areas, and in some places had flaked away completely to reveal underlying corrosion. Wharton later identified this as bronze disease, a detrimental form of corrosion that can occur on copper, brass, and bronze surfaces when exposed to chloride salts, water, and oxygen, and, when left untreated, can eat away into the surface of the metal. In addition, Wharton noted signs of corrosion of the interior iron armature (See armature (sculpture)), and stress cracks in the metal base, all issues which would need to be dealt with in the final treatment plan.[27]
One of the most challenging aspects of the conservation of Kamehameha the Great (original cast) was determining the original appearance of the statue. Since conservators traditionally strive to uphold the artist's intent when caring for an artwork, figuring out this piece of information was of critical importance. While the Honolulu cast sported a patinated surface with gilt (See gilding) garments, the North Kohala cast had been painted in lifelike colors for as long as any local residents of the island could remember, and it wasn't clear whether the statue had been originally gilt or painted. Historical accounts provided little assistance to the investigation, as articles written on the sculpture at the time of its unveiling in the 1880s offered conflicting and often contradictory descriptions of the artwork. However, by analyzing paint chip samples taken from the statue's surface using X-ray fluorescence and X-ray diffraction, Wharton was eventually able to gather evidence of 24kt gold leaf residue beneath the layers of paint, effectively concluding that the statue had, like its Honolulu counterpart, an original patinated and gilded surface.[28] Wharton theorized that because of damage caused by the shipwreck, the sculpture's surface had corroded badly before its eventual transport to Hawaiʻi in 1883, and due to lack of materials and technical expertise to regild and patinate the surface, the statue was instead cleaned and then painted entirely brown in order to prepare it in time for Kalākaua's coronation ceremony. At some point between 1883 and 1912, the tradition of painting the sculpture in multiple colors began.[29]
Because of the complexity of the decision as well as the deep cultural connection many local residents felt to the statue, Wharton devised a novel scheme to allow the Hawaiian people to decide if the statue should remain painted with lifelike colors or be restored to its original gilded appearance. An effort was made to interest young children and local students in the sculpture, in order to get adults talking about the Kamehameha the Great as a conservation object. Teachers coordinated art projects centering on the sculpture, and local community groups also got involved, making crafts and conducting research projects to increase awareness of the sculpture and the efforts to restore it. Journalists reported on the ongoing projects in the local newspapers, sometimes offering their own opinions on whether the statue should be painted or gilt.[30] Debate centered on whether it was best to restore the statue's gilded surface, which would uphold the artist's original intent and, some argued, make the statue more aesthetically appealing, or to repaint, which would honor a local tradition and increase the statue's lifelike appearance. Eventually, after listening to the input of the kūpuna (community elders), who spoke out in favor of painting the sculpture, a local ballot was held in late 2000. The results were 71% in favor of repainting.[31]
Hands-on work began on the sculpture in February 2001. After documenting the statue's initial condition, the paint was stripped away using a combination of
Spiritual and cultural significance
Since its unveiling in 1883, Kamehameha the Great has come to be regarded by Hawaiians as an important cultural, economic, and spiritual object. Despite its Western origins, influences and artist, and despite the fact that the statue was not considered a spiritual object at the time of its creation,
One of the statue's most important cultural functions is its role in the annual celebration of
Kamehameha the Great (original cast) has also become an important political symbol for the Hawaiian Islands. It is featured on the official Hawaiian state seal (See Seal of Hawaii), and in the logo of the Kamehameha Schools, which has campuses located throughout the Islands. In 1959, a replica of the statue was cast and placed inside the United States Capitol as part of the National Statuary Hall Collection to honor Hawaiʻi becoming the fiftieth state. Various businesses, especially those working in the tourist trade, have capitalized on the resulting popularity of the sculpture; its image has been used to decorate brochures, postcards, T-shirts, folk-art, etc., and small reproductions of the sculpture are popular souvenirs in many shops.[38]
Explanatory notes
- ^ On the German barque G. F. Haendel
- ^ Capt. Jervis of the Earl of Dalhousi
- flounced cotton malo,[11] probably more in the manner of the usual loincloth. The sculptor was also furnished with photographs of a featherwork "malo of Kaumualiʻi" and those of an ordinary malo.[12]
- ^ Rose (1978) refers to "Lili'uokalani feather sash" accession number 1910.18.01 at the Bishop Museum (p. 24) or "girdle" (p. 27) but rewords name as feather baldric or malo (BPBM 1910.18.01) in Rose (1978), n5. Brigham (1918) also refers to the item as "feather malo", noting its acquisition from the Queen (Lili'uokalani) 1910 (pp. 32–33 and Fig. 31 "Kaumualiʻi's Malo", and discusses it in association with the "cordon" on the Kamehameha statue (pp. 37–38). Note these older sources make no mention of this sash being owned by King Līloa, as do recent literature (Wharton (2011), p. 28) or Kamehiro (2009), labeled "BPBM 1910.018.001"[8]).
References
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
- Citations
- ^ McConnel. 1898. The Great Kamehameha. The Paradise of the Pacific 9 (9): 131–132, 137.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 20.
- ^ a b Rose (1988), pp. 132–133.
- ^ a b Wharton (2011), p. 39.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 22.
- ^ Charlot, John (March 1979b). "That Statue of Kamehameha". Honolulu. 13 (9): 35, 37–40.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 18.
- ^ ISBN 9780824832636.
- ^ Rose (1988), pp. 132–133, n5.
- ^ a b A vintage photograph of a native man wearing the feather sash (properly) is held in the Bishop Museum collection, catalogued 126,642.[24] He has the sash wrapped around the waist, then from behind over the shoulder, diagonally down against body, and tucked through at the front.
- ^ a b Charlot, Jean (July 1969), Letter To Jacob Adler On The Statue Of Kamehameha By Thomas R. Gould (PDF), Jean Charlot Foundation, archived from the original (PDF) on 2015-02-26
- ^ a b Brigham (1918), pp. 37–38 and Fig. 34 (photo of statue from behind, with the sash/cordon dangling)
- ^ a b Adler (1969), pp. 89, 95, n9.
- ^ a b Dekneef, Matthew (June 10, 2016). "Two Hawaiian Brothers Who Modeled For The Iconic Kamehameha Statue". Hawaiʻi Magazine. Honolulu. Retrieved November 15, 2016.
- ISBN 9780812201178.
- ^ Rose (1988), note 8, citing Taylor, Clarice B. (1949), "A Nuuanu Valley House," Paradise of the Pacific". Holiday Edition. pp. 22–25.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 27 produces a vintage photograph of the native fisherman held by Bishop museum, which matches the legs.
- ^ Earlier Jean Charlot had conjectured the dressed man was John T. Baker, while the more athletic physique legs belonged to his brother Robert.[11] and this assessment is repeated elsewhere.[14]
- ^ Rose (1988), note 5
- ^ Rose (1978), p. 25.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 25.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 25–26.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 27.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 28.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 27–28.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 98–101.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 5–6.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 110.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 111–112.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 103–106.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 135–138.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 148–152.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 153–155.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 78.
- ^ Cox, J. Halley, and William H. Davenport. 1988. Hawaiian Sculpture. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press.; Valeri, Valerio. 1985. Kingship and Sacrifice: Ritual and Society in Ancient Hawaii. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press.
- ^ Wharton (2011), pp. 77–81.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 88.
- ^ Wharton (2011), p. 92.
- Bibliography
- Adler, Jacob (1969). "Kamehameha Statue". The Hawaiian Journal of History. 3. Honolulu: Hawaiian Historical Society: 87–100. OCLC 60626541.
- Brigham, William T. (1918), "Additional notes on Hawaiian feather work: second supplement", Memoirs of the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum, vol. VII, Bishop Museum Press
- Rose, Roger G. (1978). Symbols of Sovereignty: Feather Girdles of Tahiti and Hawai'i. Honolulu: Department of Anthropology, Bernice P. Bishop Museum. Pacific anthropological records 28
- —— (1988). "Woodcarver F. N. Otremba and the Kamehameha Statue". The Hawaiian Journal of History. 22. Honolulu: Hawaiian Historical Society: 131–146. OCLC 60626541.
- Wharton, Glenn (2011). The Painted King: Art, Activism, and Authenticity in Hawaiʻi. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 9780824861087.