Inside the ʻumeke with artist Meleanna Aluli Meyer

The whisper could be heard in the circle were members of kumu hula Brad Lum’s hālau held hands with artist Meleanna Aluli Meyer and reflected on the Kūʻē Petitions. The voices playing on loop in the background included names from those petitions. 

The group was gathered inside a giant ʻumeke, built about 22 feet wide, and designed to hold group meetings, just like this one.

The work of art, designed by Meyer, is called ʻUmeke Lāʻau. It is located inside Honolulu Hale, the City and County of Honolulu’s center of government and home to the mayor’s office and city council meetings.

The hālau shared tears and laughs, as well as moʻolelo, or stories. Several named kupuna in their families who had signed the Kūʻē Petitions of 1897, protesting the annexation of Hawaiʻi. The Hui Kālaiʻāina’s petition, with about 17,000 signatures, called for the restoration of the monarchy, while the Aloha ʻĀina’s petition, with approximately 21,000 signatures, protested the annexation, according to the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Library’s website. 

This Friday, Feb. 28, will mark three weeks since the ʻumeke was installed. Meyer has personally met with more than a dozen groups in that space, including musicians, hālau, shamans from Mongolia and leadership of the Episcopal Church, she said.

“I just want to share that the time is now to do the work of healing,” Meyer told Aloha State Daily. “This is a fractious, impossibly difficult time for so many reasons, and I needed to go to hope.”

The ʻumeke will travel to Kapolei Hale in June. It has also been invited to Lahaina, Maui, and to Canada, she said. 

The ʻumeke is just one of many works of art on display across Oʻahu, Maui and Hawaiʻi Island as part of the Hawaiʻi Triennial 2025, which runs through May 4. The exhibit’s theme is Aloha Nō, which is “a call to know Hawaiʻi as a place of rebirth, resilience, and resistance; a place that embraces humanity in all of its complexities — with a compassion and care that can only be described as aloha,” according to HT25’s website. 

Meyer, who graduated from Stanford University with a bachelor’s degree in art in 1978 before returning to Hawaiʻi, worked with a number of people to create the ʻumeke. 

Kaʻipo and Kaʻiulani Baker — who graduated from Ke Kula ʻo Samuel M. Kamakau Laboratory Public Charter School, where Meyer taught them art — joined family and friends in reading names from the Kūʻē Petitions, a process that took more than 30 hours, she said.

Students of the carpentry class at the University of Hawaiʻi’s Honolulu Community College, led by Dean Crowell, helped to fabricate the piece. The lead fabricators included Kainoa Gruspe and Amber Khan “the significant hands and heart behind team ʻumeke,” she said.

“It's all about pilina,” Meyer said. “It's all about relationships. And then when you know each other, you can count on each other. And that's what's so extraordinary about the work. It's not just a piece of art. It's actually much more than that.”

To set a meeting in the space, sign up here.