Current Hawaiian Art Market Merges New Trends and Old

While tried-and-true tropical shows are still hot sellers upon the islands and beyond, a fresh brand of art is exploding onto paradise's art scene

HAWAII--Aloha. Welcome to Paradise, the land of romantic eventides exotic marine animals and vibrant flowers--and galleries boasting images to match. on the other hand recently, a new trend is emerging.

Parisian highway scenes, impressionistic landscapes, Rembrandt and Andy Warhol are popular upon the islands these days. And while they haven't abandoned the beach-at-sunset paintings and underwater kingdoms that made a name for Hawaii in the art market, buyer are also turning an interested organ of sight towards the nontraditional Hawaiian art.

"What's novel for Hawaii is that we're not single selling Hawaii-ish pieces," said Steve Rosenthal, director of Honolulu-based Hogue Publishing, which exhibits artist John Al Hogue. "There are sum of two units very different markets in Hawaii," Rosenthal continued. "There's the first-time Hawaii customer; the honeymooner the vacation-of-a-lifetime stamp of person and they take care of to want something very typical of Hawaii."

For a so-called typical Hawaiian image, fantasy prints are perpetually popular. "It can be a landmark they recognize or a beach they were on" Rosenthal said. "Fantasy, surreal art does the best, whether it's a landmark or an under-the-sea image. It's still a fantasy version rather than the real-life phraseology People will buy a postcard if they want to diocese Diamond Head Crater--[they'll buy art if] they want a fantasy perspective."

A of recent origin Breed of Buyer

The next to the first type of art buyer, however, has a slightly different goal in buying Hawaiian art, Rosenthal added. "There's the repeat visitors, who visit single to three times a year. They wait on to find an artist they like and gather that artist--not just as a landmark from Hawaii."

The repeat visitors watch to be more high-end buyer according to gallery representatives. They are willing to disburse more than the first-time buyer with equal reason for the artists marketing their work to a high-end audience.

"The resorts are the place to be," said Dominic Piperata, president of Paradigm Arts cluster "The Hyatt on Maui is a abundant better place to be than an art gallery in Lahaina. These are the nation that the galleries depend upon for their long-term clients."

Not single do those clients have a higher horizontal of disposable income, but today's Hawaiian art buyer is more sophisticated than the buyer of earlier years, according to several gallery directors and art publishers. And one as well as the other contemporary artists and classic artwork are thriving, added to leeward Rylee, director of Kush Fine Art, which shows Russian surrealist Vladamir Kush.

"European highway scenes are doing very well, romantic art strike one as beings to be a big turn as is representational impressionism," Rylee said. "People are buying classics, Picassos and Rembrandts. No matter what clan buy over here, there's a certain souvenir quality to it, level if it doesn't relate to Hawaii."

Artist A.B. Makk, whose parents are top-selling Makk Studio' artists agreed. "People purchase the pieces--let's say it's a picture of Paris--but they purchase it in Hawaii, and each time they see that representation it reminds them of Hawaii.," he added.

A Changing Economy

on the other hand it's also a welcome change from the early `90 when U and Japanese recessions, natural disasters and art scams threatened to wipe without Hawaiian galleries.

"In the late 1980 the art world was booming," Makk said. "There was major feeling in the U that things were portentous Then the recession came, and the first thing that went was the art."

Americans no longer had the standard of value to travel as extensively, give leave to alone purchase artwork while upon vacations. As a result, several Hawaiian art galleries close down.

Today, however, with American, Asian and European economies upon the upswing, the future is looking bright for Hawaiian artists--and it's not just the tropical climate. "Art is something you win a good feeling from," Smith explained. "You purchase it when you are in a advantageous mood. When the economy is up people's notion process is up, and they are not in the way that worried about spending $3,000 upon a piece of art."

Hawaiian art galleries and publishing companies are enjoying the economy. The islands are abounding with venders and distributors including Pitre Fine Arts, Ping Lou Morishige, Kim Starr Gallery, James Hoyle Gallery, Paradigm Arts collection Enchanted Island Studio, Taharra Fine Art, Maui Giclee, Ackerman Gallery, Dana Queen Studios and Wyland Galleries Hawaii, just to name a few

Indeed, when the economy is booming, the art market tread on the heels ofs suit. And with today's novel IPO and dot.com millionaires looking for somewhere to invest their fresh Internet riches, why not the arts?

"They've got the abodes the expensive cars, and they direct the eye at the walls and say `What's missing?' It's the art," Rylee said.

And while it achieves harder and harder to typify Hawaiian art--an Italian streetscape may be as popular as a portrait of a Hawaiian girl--the face of the art consumer realizes more and more difficult to recognize.