In Hawaii, an art exhibit with works so rare the public has never seen them

Two pieces of early art of Hawaii, never before seen by the public, as well as other rare works will be on display at one of Oahu’s most acclaimed hotels.

“Visions of Hawaii 1778-1848” recently opened at the Halekulani, a luxury hotel whose roots date to the early 1900s.

The original art and engravings are from the private collection of Mark and Carolyn Blackburn, owners of one of the world’s largest assemblages of Polynesian art.

“Visions” will show to the public for the first time two drawings created by explorers aboard the French ship Uranie, which stopped in the Hawaiian Islands in 1819 during an around-the-world expedition.

One work, sketched in a village on Maui, depicts a bare-breasted woman adorned with body art and performing traditional hula.

Halekulani means “house befitting heaven,” a name bestowed by local fishermen who began beaching their canoes on the site in 1883. Owner Robert Lewers created a residential hotel on the land in 1907. In 1917, Juliet and Clifford Kimball bought the property and turned it into a posh resort for Oahu vacationers.

The free exhibit is open 9 a.m.-8 p.m. daily through Nov. 30. The works hang in the resort’s gallery, beside the House Without a Key restaurant.

MORE:

How artist Louis Macouillard’s watercolors of Hawaii for Matson Lines inspired a life of travel

Has paradise disappared? Chasing the Hawaiian ideal in modern Honolulu

Hawaiian animal shelter on Kauai lets visitors take dogs on a daytime adventure

Follow us on Twitter at @latimestravel