Pele Pono

PETE WHITE Pele Pono (2002). Woodcut. 15 x 9 1/4".

This is the first of my Kapa Amakua series, and was completed in 2002. The title combines the name of the Hawaiian fire goddess with the name of the protagonist in Kiana Davenport's novel, Shark Dialogues.

This print was done on the occasion of my Auntie Robin Pele's return to the islands. The image is of a tiger shark, my family's aumakua, superimposed over an image of the Hawaiian Islands. In the upper left hand corner is a stylized volcano.

This was printed with two blocks. The brown background is a piece of plywood, which I added texture to by sandblasting. The brown block was hand printed using a baren, and the black block using a hand press. The print was done with oil-based Daniel Smith ink on BFK Rives paper, sized 22 x 15".

The edition is of 15. The image above is 3/15. There are approximately 5 prints still available.