Wanting to share this cool exhibit with others, we met Julie and Mike (our older son's in-laws) at the Cannon Gallery for another visit with  John “Keoni” Meigs and his awesome patterns.

According to Meigs, “In a sense, Aloha shirts put Hawaii on the map. The first thing people did when they arrived was make a beeline for a department store to buy one. A lot of kooky things were designed, but I always tried to be a purist when it came to using motifs from Hawaiian sources.”

My focus was on Paul Gauguin. One doesn't usually think of this famous French artist when one thinks of a Hawaiian shirt but Keoni did. He felt a bond with Gauguin. Much like him, Keoni left western ideals for an island life. It was 1890 when Gauguin left France and everything he felt restricted by behind and moved to the island of Tahiti. So influenced by the frenchman's Noa Noa woodcut prints, Keoni created the very similar pattern (above) and even included the initials P.G.O. (Gauguin's signature while in Polynesia).
During his first visit to Tahiti (1891-1893), Paul Gauguin documented his experiences in his travel journal, Noa Noa. We first encounter the phrase, 'noa noa,' when Gauguin describes the scent of the Tahitian women, "A mingled perfume, half animal, half vegetable emanated from them; the perfume of their blood and of the gardenias—tiaré—which they wore in their hair."
I continue to delight in repeating experiences in which I learn something new.
And for those of you who are missing this exhibit while it's in Carlsbad, never fear, it's traveling to a town near you! You'll have your chance. It will be in Reno from Sept. 1 to Oct. 20 at the Wilbur D. May Museum and it will land at the Temecula History Museum next year, June 16- August 11, 2020. Mahalo to the curator, Dale Hope, for sharing Aloha with us all.