The Greenland shadow over a wonderful Hawaiʻi exhibition
Photo: The illustrated catalogue, Hawaiʻi: a kingdom crossing oceans, edited by Alice Christophe, accompanies the exhibition.
Daniel Nelson
US desire to take over Greenland casts an ominous shadow over the British Museum’s superb new exhibition, Hawaiʻi: a kingdom crossing oceans.
The two islands have nothing in common, but the exhibition reminds us that Hawaii’s “special relationship” with Britain came to an unceremonious end in 1893 with a US-backed military coup by Western business interests.
The Hawaiian queen reached out to her British counterpart for help, but Perfidious Albion declined to intervene, noting that the fate of Hawaii’s kingdom was “in the hands of the Almighty”.
The island became the 50th state of the US in 1959.
Hawaiian-British relations are firmly at the heart of the exhibition but although much is made of the “deep connections between our two peoples”, this is no longer true. Only the British museum, a handful of historians and migrants and surf-seeking tourists keep the links alive.
The exhibition shows what we are missing. And what Hawaii is missing, since many of the striking objects on display are owned by the British Museum.
And what objects. Gorgeous bark cloths, in-your-face carvings (starting with a basalt figure that is the very essence of solidity), magnificent feathered gods’ heads, impressive courtly clothes, turtle-shell and boar-tusk ornaments, fascinating bowls — a wonderfully crafted blend of colours, shapes and textures.
These arresting artefacts are not all from the past: work fashioned by contemporary artists shows that even if the history highlighted here is all-but-forgotten by Brits and even if Hawaiian farming has been swamped by US-style monoculture plantations, Hawaiian artistic creativity still lives and breathes.
It’s fitting that the British Museum has created this meticulously curated exhibition, because the museum was visited by King Liholiho (Kamehameha II) and Queen Kamāmalu, both in their 20s, when they became the first Hawaiian royals to visit England in 1824. Hawaii’s position was a triumph of statecraft (not least by resisting colonisation) as well as tragedy: both died of measles during the visit.
Such events are a stark reminder of the unexpected twists of politics, as is the shortness of Hawaii and England’s brief dalliance. They are also a warning of what could be lost 200 years later by a US land grab in a collider clime.
Hawaiʻi: a kingdom crossing oceans, £14-£16 (under-16s free when accompanied by an adult ticket holder, 2-for-1 student tickets on Fridays, concessions and group rates available), is at the British Museum, Great Russell Street, WC1B 3DG until 25 May. Info: British Museum
+ 29 Jan, Curator’s tour, 5.30 - 6,30pm, free
+ 12 Feb, Hawaiian royal portraits and diplomacy, online, free