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Exhibitions

Bishop Museum Announces New Exhibition,Corned Beef & Kalo

Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum announces a new exhibition coming to its J. M. Long Gallery in March.

Corned Beef & Kalo, curated by Healoha Johnston, Bishop Museum director of Cultural Resources and curator for Hawaiʻi and Pacific Arts and Culture, will feature Pisupo lua afe (Corned Beef 2000) by Michel Tuffery and KALO by Bernice Akamine. The exhibition brings together two iconic works of contemporary art to consider how artists make visible issues related to agricultural subsistence, environmental sustainability, and everyday life where food imports and structured land use intertwine.

Akamine's KALO installation features the pages of the Kūʻē Petitions copied on newsprint paper and attached to pōhaku (stones) in reference to Hawaiʻi's origin stories and aloha ʻāina movements. Tuffery grapples with the convergence of everyday consumer items, customary practice, and commercialized foodways in the Pacific. Together, they bring our attention to the way a society's worldview informs everyday actions within larger food systems and can support healthy relationships between people and the environment.

Bishop Museum is the host venue for Mālama Hāloa Festival 2024 and an official venue for the Festival of Pacific Arts and Culture (FestPAC) 2024 in collaboration with The Pacific Community (SPC), celebrating the theme: "Hoʻoulu Lāhui: Regenerating Oceania" honoring the traditions that FestPAC exists to perpetuate with an eye toward the future. Corned Beef & Kalo is developed in partnership with Ed "Makahiapo" Cashman, Director of Ka Papa Loʻi ʻO Kānewai at Hawaiʻinuiākea School of Hawaiian Knowledge, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa in conjunction with the Mālama Hāloa Festival and the Festival of Pacific Arts and Culture 2024.

Corned Beef & Kalo opens to the public in Bishop Museum's J. M. Long Gallery in Hawaiian Hall on Saturday, March 9, 2023, and runs through Sept. 8, 2024. Additional information and tickets can be found at BishopMuseum.org.

Media Preview Opportunity on Thursday, March 7, 2023

Bishop Museum invites members of the media to attend an exclusive, pre-opening, closed-door Media Preview of Corned Beef & Kalo:

  • Thursday, March 7, 2023
  • 1-4 p.m. HST
  • Bishop Museum, J. M. Long Gallery, Hawaiian Hall Complex
  • Please RSVP with Lance Aquino via the contact information above

Interview opportunities:

  • Bishop Museum Director of Cultural Resources and Exhibition Co-curator Healoha Johnston
  • Bishop Museum Director of Exhibits and Corned Beef & Kalo Exhibit Designer Brad Evans

About Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum, the State of Hawaiʻi Museum of Natural and Cultural History

Bishop Museum’s mission is to inspire our community and visitors through the exploration, celebration, and perpetuation of the extraordinary history, culture, and environment of Hawaiʻi and the Pacific. The Museum was founded in 1889 by Charles Reed Bishop in memory of his wife Bernice Pauahi Bishop, a royal descendant of King Kamehameha I. Today, the Museum thrives as an educational center for the community and is widely regarded as the world’s premier institution for Hawaiian and Pacific content.

Bishop Museum’s vast collections of more than 25 million objects and specimens represent nine disciplines and include more than 22 million biological specimens, over 2 million cultural objects, 115,000 historical publications, and 1 million photographs, films, works of art, audio recordings, and manuscripts. These collections tell the stories of the cultures and biodiversity of Hawaiʻi and the Pacific as well as the proud legacy of scholarly research spanning 130 years.

Bishop Museum proudly serves more than 200,000 visitors each year, including 20,000 children on school visits. Guests are encouraged to pre-plan their trip to #HawaiisMuseum with its free digital guide, available through Bloomberg Connects.

To learn more about the Museum’s research, collections, exhibits, and programs, visit BishopMuseum.org, follow @BishopMuseum on Facebook and Instagram, visit Bishop Museum’s YouTube channel, or call (808) 847-3511. Bishop Museum is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

Bishop Museum is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity and Affirmative Action Employer, and welcomes applicants from the military, veterans, and those with disabilities. Learn about careers at Bishop Museum at BishopMuseum.org/Careers and on its LinkedIn page.

Bishop Museum Press is Hawaiʻi’s oldest book publisher and one of the first scholarly publishers in the Western Hemisphere, and has published over 1,200 titles and distributed over 1 million books in 72 countries worldwide. Bishop Museum hosts a restaurant and gift shop on campus, Tūtū’s Place by Highway Inn and Shop Pacifica by Nā Mea Hawaiʻi.