Sam Ka’ai is a living legend and was on the first voyage of the Hokulea that proved navigation was done by the stars and the Hawaiians came from Tahiti. He is a master sculptor and a guide for the Hawaiian men helping to bring back their participation in cultural practices.
About this interview
Suzy Papanikolas tells the story behind her painting of Sam Kaʻai — master carver, cultural leader, and crew member on the first voyage of the Hōkūleʻa to Tahiti, which proved that Hawaiians navigated the Pacific by the stars, currents, winds, and birds, without instruments. Kaʻai carved the male and female figures that watch over the canoe’s stern, and served as a fisherman on that historic crossing, greeted in Tahiti by crowds on the beach.
Papanikolas recounts the vision of Herb Kāne, who founded the Hōkūleʻa project to prove the voyaging tradition; the young Nainoa Thompson, who would carry navigation forward to a new generation; and the second voyage’s capsizing, in which Eddie Aikau paddled for help and was never found — and after which Sam’s ceremonial conch, lost in the wreck, was recovered in the rescuers’ nets. She also describes the annual sunrise ceremony Kaʻai founded on Hawaiʻi Island to restore Hawaiian men’s participation in cultural practice, and her own years alongside him at the canoe-carving festivals of Lahaina. The painting shows Kaʻai across the seasons of his life — a living tribute to the revival of the culture itself.
