ʻŌLELO NOʻEAU #230

ʻAʻole noi ʻike ke kanaka i na nani o kona wahi i hānau ʻia ai.

A person doesn’t see all the beauties of his birthplace.

You don’t realize how beautiful your home is until you go away.

-Mary Kawena Pukui, Ōlelo Noʻeau: Hawaiian Proverbs & Poetical Sayings

Though it can be interpreted in various ways, “kuʻu ēwe, kuʻu piko” can be translated to mean “my umbilical, my navel” in Hawaiian. I use these words to refer to my connection to my Native Hawaiian ancestry and to emphasize that this connection is still intact.

It is to acknowledge the ancestral ties that I have recognized have been strained, or in some instances, completely lost within my family. 

Thus, this body of work showcases my ongoing journey to reacquaint myself with my multicultural background and utilizes aspects of the land, the various cultures, and the histories present within Hawai’i to foster a stronger connection and understanding to my home and how my relationship to it will change. 

Artist Bio

Tiana Nanayo Kuuleialoha Honda was born and raised on the island of Hawaiʻi in the small town of Hilo. Though her cultural background consists of several mixed ethnicities, she primarily identifies as Native Hawaiian (from her mother) and Japanese (from her father). Tiana received her B.A. in Art with a minor in Japanese Studies from the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo in 2019 and will receive her MFA in Visual Art from the University of Kansas in 2023.