00:00:00 - Bryan Murphy
Coming up next on Hawaii's Best, a.
00:00:03 - Patrick Parker
Lot of people lost everything. I'll put one name out there, Ruby Mazar. He just opened up his new gallery and had all of his paintings from his like everything that was around and he had it there and was having a grand opening, I think the next day. Even lost everything.
00:00:19 - Announcement
Aloha. Welcome to Hawaii's Best.
00:00:21 - Bryan Murphy
Best.
00:00:21 - Announcement
Here you'll learn what to know before traveling as we discover Hawaiian culture, local businesses and the experiences that make Hawai one of the most incredible places in the world. And now your host, Bryan Murphy.
00:00:36 - Bryan Murphy
Aloha, thank you so much for tuning in today. Today we're talking all about the art community on Maui and specifically the art community in Lahaina. We're going to be talking with an artist on Maui, Patrick Parker, and about the GoFundMe that he set up to help replace art supplies for Lahaina. Artists. So stay tuned for that. There's been a lot of talk this past week about Maui being open to travel and I just want to kind of echo that and say yes, Maui is open. There was a lot of confusion.
00:01:09 - Speaker D
I think that very first week a.
00:01:11 - Bryan Murphy
Lot of emotion of don't come to Maui right now trying to figure out what's going on. And there's been a lot more clarity from officials and from even locals on Maui about how to travel to Maui during this time and by being respectful as you travel. And I think that's super important. That's what we're going to be talking about the next month, really month of September is highlighting local businesses that need your support, whether on island or off island, how to help them keep their doors open, really? And highlighting ways in which that we can all travel more responsibly to Hawai and specifically to Maui during this delicate time. Now obviously it probably goes without saying that Lahaina is completely off limits to visiting. Don't go to Lahaina, don't try to get to Lahaina. If you're on Maui, don't, just don't out of respect and out of the recovery efforts, please don't go to Lahaina. A lot of people are saying and even officials that the west is closed, west side of Maui is closed. There's a lot of community and there's a lot of small businesses up on the west side that have been impacted and want to help support them as well. And this Friday I'm going to get some more clarity about what that means because obviously the rest of Maui, South Maui, Kihei, upcountry all around the rest of the island is open and welcoming for visitors right now. But there's this communication of west Maui is closed and I get it, Lahaina is completely off limits, which is on the west side, but what does that mean for the communities past Lahaina? How can we continue to support them? So that's a big question I have. This Friday we're going to be joined by Garrett Morerero who is the CEO and co founder of Maui Brewing Company and he's been boots on the ground leading initiatives into the recovery efforts for Lahaina. And prior to this he has been a huge community leader for businesses on Maui. So I'd love to get his take on that. So be sure to not miss that episode and the easiest way to not miss that episode is to hit the follow button and you'll get that episode as soon as it comes out on Friday. We record it literally on Friday morning and then I edit it and post it as quickly as possible. So it'll probably be around Friday lunchtime or something is when the episode will go live. I want to thank those who have left a review and a rating. That means a lot to know because creating this podcast but more so, it's to help other people who love Hawaii as much as you be able to find this content and learn how to support local, especially during this time for those businesses on Maui and as much as we can to continue to donate and give to those organizations. Really wanted to put story to voice in highlighting these small businesses on Maui so that's why there's been a push to thank you so much for your rating and reviews. I want to read a quick review from Apple podcast. This comes from a user by the name of I want more mythology on Apple podcasts. I always love the usernames and the review is super simple. I loved my trip because of this great. So I mean it doesn't have to be hard. Just hitting the rating and hitting a quick review really does help other people make a decision to hit play and like, okay, yeah, maybe I'll give this podcast a chance. So thank you so much for doing that. So in today's conversation with Patrick Parker you're going to want to stay tuned because he's going to give some tips on how to travel to Maui responsibly. There's been this term responsible tourism, it's been thrown out there a lot. Sometimes I say the phrase travel with Aloha and we've tried to define that and what that means over a lot of different, you know, go back and listen to some episodes but really trying to get some definition behind what does it really mean and look like to travel with aloha to Maui. And Patrick's going to give his insight and his perspective on that which I think is great, to always get as much perspective as possible. And we're also going to talk about what that GoFundMe is and what it goes towards to the art community of Lahaina and how you can be directly impactful in your giving and that if so you choose, be sure you hang out to the end of this conversation. Patrick Parker by the age of ten was already mastering watercolor techniques and by 13 he was diving into the world of drawing and design. So his passion led him to university, where he graduated with a degree in fine art. He initially embarked on a journey into graphic design, but Patrick eventually transitioned into the world of fine art and capturing the essence of the ocean. And from vibrant sunsets and iconic palm trees to powerful waves and mesmerizing sea animals, Patrick's fantasy seascapes are a delightful dive into nature. And if you're a surf enthusiast, you might recall the 2016 Vans Triple Crown of surfing, where one of Patrick's stunning collage pieces became the face of that event on T shirts, hats, board, shorts, and even window displays during the live broadcasts of the contest. That's pretty cool. Calling Maui home, Patrick splits his time between riding waves, obviously, and creating masterpieces in his home studio, whether it's painting spontaneous bursts of inspiration or crafting a commissioned piece, which we're going to talk about later on in this episode, about what it means to commission a piece with Patrick and maybe with another artist. Patrick's art is a testament to his love for the ocean and his incredible talent. And he was also on a previous episode of the podcast, which I will link below. So be sure to check that out for the GoFundMe. I'm just going to give you the link right now. Towards the end, Patrick does give the GoFundMe link, but I just want to make it even super simple. You can go to Hawaii's Bestbestravel. Com slash art, and that'll automatically direct you to the GoFundMe page. So let's go ahead and let's talk story with Patrick Parker.
00:07:52 - Speaker D
Patrick, it's great to see you, man. How are you doing? How are you holding up right now?
00:07:57 - Patrick Parker
Really tired, pretty exhausted. This has been a lot to handle. It's not something that you really can ever prepare for. I know first, I didn't lose a lot of family or friends on that side of the island, but I know a lot of people who did. I know a lot of businesses and owners that lost their businesses, so and a lot of artists that lost all their art. I myself lost about, like, 18 pieces of art, original art. So trying to rebuild a part of my business, just taking it day by day, it's not something that there's any answers for right now. You just got to sleep when you can eat well. There's a lot of support from all over the world, which has been pretty amazing, but the grieving is so tiring already. And then to have to hold space for other people who are also grieving is also very tiring. So just trying to stay rested when I can and get back into as much art as I can as well.
00:08:52 - Speaker D
For me, that's healing you've been creating during these last couple of weeks yeah.
00:08:57 - Patrick Parker
A lot of my clients and collectors and friends have reached out and say, how can I help? And I'm like, I need support for the next however long till I can find a gallery that did that. Well, for me, that gallery was the majority of my income and it's dust, so try to find other ways. So the first thing I did was put it out there that I'm taking missions, but yeah, creating. I love it. I love to do art and there's a lot of new ideas coming in from people, so I'm excited to start all these different projects for them.
00:09:28 - Speaker D
Yeah, I love to come back to that. I just have questions on how that process works from just trying to paint a picture for people listening. Whereabouts are you located on Maui?
00:09:40 - Patrick Parker
So I'm up in Kula and there was also a lot of fires up here. There was 19 homes burned and countless acres of farmland and pasture land. So it's been a struggle up here too. Right now our water supply is damaged. My home is safe. I got about 2 miles away. I was actually off island.
00:10:01 - Speaker D
Oh, really?
00:10:02 - Patrick Parker
I was in Seattle with visiting my family and hearing the news, getting texts from everybody like, hey, are you safe? I'm like, what's going on? And then checking everything, checking in with my bull, live on my property, like, what's going on? And they're like, oh, the house is fine right now, we're going to prepare to evacuate. It's a few miles away, but luckily it stopped close to my house. But then all the videos and all the friends talking to friends and the first hand accounts started to come in. I'm floored, I'm with family trying to be present, love on them and then my home, all my friends were there just having a huge effect on their life, this fire. So it was like being in two places at once was pretty difficult.
00:10:47 - Speaker D
When did you arrive back on island and what was that like coming back home?
00:10:51 - Patrick Parker
Fires happened Tuesday, I got back Saturday.
00:10:53 - Speaker D
That's a long time to kind of be in both places.
00:10:58 - Patrick Parker
Yeah, it was nice being with my family, my immediate family.
00:11:01 - Speaker D
Okay.
00:11:02 - Patrick Parker
Yeah. When I landed so solemn on the airplane, it was about half full. When I booked the flight it was full but I cried right when I landed. I could hear some tears and just flying into Maui and seeing Kula, the flight path kind of goes over where I live and you could some little bit of smoke still coming up, helicopters still dumping water and see a lot of the burn. I didn't get a chance to see Lahaina from the air. I think I'm going to go next week. I'm going to drop off some art and talk with the gallery owner Chris Egan and his wife Robin Egan that lost their gallery. It's been like one long day.
00:11:41 - Speaker D
So the feel on Maui right now is still obviously pretty heavy and there's a lot of grief.
00:11:47 - Patrick Parker
Yeah. The first few days of shock and then sadness and then there's a lot of anger right now. Okay, who's responsible? Why did this happen? How could it have been avoided? There's some acceptance, like I'm accepting that this island will be forever changed. There's no way you can just remake a centuries old city that used to be the capital of Hawaii and King Kamehameha lived there for decades. It's not something you can just, oh, let's just build that up here and make it that's kind of settling in. The businesses are suffering in a lot of ways. Just like COVID when tourism, this isn't full stop in tourism, but you can imagine how much of an impact that has on all the businesses. So that's kind of getting really hot over here. Please come back.
00:12:34 - Speaker D
Yeah, maybe we can hang out there for a couple of minutes. At first the message was loud and clear. Get off the island, don't come right now. We're like in crisis. Triage, we need help right now, which there's still a lot of help that needs to be had. It feels like the conversation the last few days at least from this recording has been a clear communication of the rest of Maui is open. Is that accurate being on island? And is that the feel of the people?
00:13:06 - Patrick Parker
Yeah. West Maui is pretty much off limits. A lot of the businesses over there that did survive north of Lahaina, a lot of them are shut down. A lot of people are being housed over there. They're moving into the hotels this week having seen tourists running know, enjoying the beaches and yes, please come to Maui, enjoy the other beaches there's. So know the roads I think are open now. Please come and enjoy the rest of the island. There's so much to do here and there's a lot of local businesses that could use your support by local eat out at local restaurants, pass up on the McDonald's. Little auntie and uncle could use a little support. There's a lot of boutique jobs here, lots of cool stuff. We definitely need tourism and as much as it'd be awesome to live on a utopian island with our own food and do that stuff, it's just how it is right now.
00:13:59 - Speaker D
Sure, I love to zoom out a little bit and just talk more about Lahaina. And I think a lot of people realize now they do at least the historic impact and history of Lahaina. But in regards to art, how did that come to be such it's kind of like the art capital of Hawaii, if you will. How did that come know?
00:14:23 - Patrick Parker
I've had that question asked to me recently, so I did a little research and right now obviously it's not there, but it was the third largest art market in the US.
00:14:33 - Speaker D
Oh wow.
00:14:34 - Patrick Parker
And there's three or four dozen galleries that were selling artwork from international artists to local artists to a single tiny studio that one person just painting every day in the studio and selling their art. And the research that I did, I was finding that it's pretty simple. Like Maui is such a beautiful place and a lot of artists started to move here and do art and so they would open up art galleries as it got more and more popular and more people lahaina and then restaurants and it started to become this little mecca. More bigger galleries started coming, like more international galleries. But basically it's the artists who live here were inspired to move here. That's been going on for decades. Yeah, hopefully it can rebuild itself and that can be a part of the community as well. Again, but that's not up to me, that's up to the people who own properties over there.
00:15:26 - Speaker D
In regards to the art community as a whole on Maui, have you connected with other artists and how are they doing? What impact have they been had because of this strategy?
00:15:40 - Patrick Parker
I'd say three or four people I've been helping and talking to and trying to figure out what their needs are. And a lot of people lost everything. I'll put one name out there, Ruby Mazar. He just opened up his new gallery and had all of his paintings from everything that was around and he had it there and was having a grand opening, I think the next day even.
00:16:02 - Speaker D
Are you serious?
00:16:03 - Patrick Parker
Lost everything?
00:16:04 - Speaker D
Oh man.
00:16:05 - Patrick Parker
There's some artists that work out of their studio that they sell their art out of little gallery space or something or their home and they lost everything. So I personally lost a bunch of art in the gallery, but I didn't lose my home or material, so I can get working right away. A lot of artists can't. They don't have a home, they don't have a theo space, so it's hard. And one thing I could like to put out right now, there's a GoFundMe that I started to help supply artists with art supplies. So we can talk about that at some point if needed.
00:16:39 - Speaker D
Yeah, I mean, definitely, let's dive into that. There's so many organizations out there and so many people. The purpose of this is to bring voice and story behind some of these opportunities to support. For me personally, you and another artist that was in Maui have been a huge part for me. I mean, people can't see, but there's a couple pieces behind me that you've done. The art coming out of Maui has personally played a huge part in my life and I think in a lot of people's lives. So they might not have even thought about ways in which they can support the art community on Maui. So let's dive into that a little bit. Let's talk a little bit about what that GoFundMe is and what it goes towards.
00:17:29 - Patrick Parker
The GoFundMe is all about getting art supplies for haina artists. I'm starting a list of artists that I've known and I'm reaching out to artists that live there and starting to get people involved with hey, what are your needs? And this is a place. This is a person myself you can talk to, and I can order art supplies for you, have it delivered, your home. And so I have a fund going right now, art supplies for Lahaina. Artists. A GoFundMe on there. You can donate any amount anonymous or have your name. And this is something that's real dear to me, because what if I was in that position and another artist was helping me? That would be soulmate. I want to be able to be that person to help my coworkers. In a way. We're a family. We're not in competition. We're all just creating art to sell and enjoy our life, and that's our passion and to have it all taken away. I'd want support to get started again. I want to just create, receive where you can and just hopefully keep that art career going. It's a passion that people spend their whole life on a journey, and to have something like this happen, it could end it if you don't have the right support. So hopefully the little support that this fund can bring into some artists and bring some hope to them.
00:18:55 - Speaker D
We'll link the GoFundMe, and for people who are interested, definitely check that in the episode description. You're getting commission work. I kind of want to go back to that a little bit. Could you just describe that process for someone who might be interested?
00:19:11 - Patrick Parker
Yeah. So a lot of artists like to challenge themselves with doing a commission for someone else. A lot of artists don't want to do commissions. They just want to paint for themselves and show in a gallery, online, whatever. I enjoy doing commissions for people because there's a personal aspect of that, being in contact with the client, the collector, and exchanging ideas and trying to you're on a journey together. You're trying to understand what their needs are, what color palette they want, what medium they want it to work, be in and create something that you're proud of and that they want to put on their wall and look at every day. So there's a lot to it in terms of emotionally for the artists to be able to fulfill this need. I've been doing it for about a professional artist for 17 years now, and I've done hundreds of commissions, and each one starts off with just, hey, what would you like painted? And some people have these crazy ideas. I'm like, that's not really what I want to do.
00:20:13 - Speaker D
I could imagine.
00:20:14 - Patrick Parker
But how about this? Maybe pull them a little bit, like, oh, this is in my scope. If you want a portrait portrait artist. I do tropical seascapes and waves. I do paper collage with turtles and whales and waves and sunsets. And that's something that I've been doing for a long that's like that's my niche. So let's say when someone comes to me and go, hey, Patrick, I'd love to know what's pricing and sizing and how do I do this? So I say, OK, what are your needs want? Generally, they've seen something of mine. They want something.
00:20:54 - Speaker D
Oh, OK.
00:20:55 - Patrick Parker
I'd like two turtles kissing know, just something you think about in the ocean, a whale breaching at sunset. I'd love a wave in the background and a little hut and a sunset with some waterfalls. I'm like, great. All right, go on my website, check out the color palettes from different pieces I've done before, and let's pick a color palette that you want and that really helps visually guide someone. You can say, oh, let's have it in warm tones or pinks and purples. Well, what kind of pink? What kind of purple? On my website, you can look through a bunch of the art I've already made and see that. So then I do a sketch or a couple of sketches, depending on if I nail it or not. And once a sketch is decided upon and signed off by the client, maybe I'll do some color in there as well, just to really solidify in their mind, like what it's going to look like. And then I start the process, gather the materials for paper collage. I print out all the textures and colors that I'm going to need and start doing sketches on the board that I'm going to work on and the sole tying during the process. When I get to a certain point, I'll send pictures to the client, and that's really fun because they get to see it develop. Usually if you walk into a gallery or you see something online, it's totally finished online. There's some great videos of like, time lapses where you can see the whole thing done. Sure, that's always fun. This kind of has a little bit of mystique to it, which is kind of cool, too, because you don't get to see the whole process because I don't just sit down and do it in one day and time lapse recording. It takes weeks. I'll work 3 hours this day, 4 hours that day, work on another piece of art, refresh the eyes with different mediums and hands with different mediums, and come back to it. And that gives you time to look at the piece sitting over there in the corner and being like, all right, what do I need? I don't know what I need yet. Let's give another day. And then I'll work on a piece, figure something out on that piece, and then bring that into the next other piece. But it's fun with the galleries. Sometimes I would go in and work on pieces in the gallery live, which is fun to meet people and explain the process and show what's going on. Sadly, that's gone for now. For Lahaina, which was like the Mecca for that, doing live art, walking around, checking out galleries. Yeah, commissions are a lot of the work I'm going to be doing for the next six months to supplement the gallery sales. If you are interested please contact me. There's other artists too that would love commissions. Some of these artists that I'm talking about because we're needing support with GoFundMe they have amazing art and maybe one of those artists is the way you like, you like their style. You want to commission them or maybe they do have a few pieces that survived and they have something on their wall already that they could sell you.
00:23:44 - Speaker D
I can imagine someone that maybe back and forth communication like well I was thinking that that tone or someone as patient as yourself I'm sure makes that process comfortable and trying to draw out of what they want. Like I want a platypus wearing a detective hat on the beach. You probably want a platypus wearing a detective hat on the beach. Maybe you do. You get to know your clients, the clients get to know you and there's that connective piece of just this art that will I think on your end thinking about legacy like that art is going to last generations which is pretty cool to think about it like that. So I think that's rad shifting gears a little bit in this term of responsible tourism has kind of resurfaced and gained more traction. I'm curious from your perspective on Maui, how would you define that term responsible tourism?
00:24:40 - Patrick Parker
That's a loaded question. In some ways I don't have roots, ancestral roots here but for someone who's living here just how would you act in your hometown when you know that you're going to run into people that you know? I think that would be a good way to be in Hawaii. There's obviously a lot of grieving going on right now so tempers might be a little tight right at the top, ready to explode in some ways. So I just say be very mindful of your awareness and attitude toward things. If it's oh I want to be somewhere and there's traffic or that beach is closed because of something like it's you're, you're on vacation, enjoy it. Try to try to let the anxiety out because there's plenty of that already here at the moment. No need to bring anymore. Sure but this is a beautiful place with a lot of space, maui in particular. It's a big island with a lot of hidden places to explore. Bring in and take out any trash, just leave footprints and take know it's part of Hawaii is tourism and we love it. I love meeting new people from all over the know. A lot of tourists find my art and I'm super grateful for that. So it's not something that like I'm a tourist, I travel to other islands, I don't live there. I travel to different places around the world and I understand how it is to be around a lot of people who don't live there. So you just tread lightly, do what you think is ethical and moral for you.
00:26:14 - Speaker D
That's good. That's well said. Thinking about that going around your own town and some might be like, well, I don't care. I'll just go do whatever I want around my own town or whatever. But that mindset, you'll have a bummer time. You won't experience Hawaii to its full. And I kind of joked with you over text, like trying to create some sort of thesis on it. We need responsible tourists. We need responsible travelers. We need to travel with aloha. Yeah, that's cool. Okay. What how what does that we how do we put a definition behind and how we tangibly do that? And one of the things as you were talking kind of popped in my head and I'll see these itineraries of once in a lifetime trip to Hawaii. And there's itinerary like, day one we're going to do this and day two, that and it's like you've built it like you're visiting Walt Disney World. You're going to be high stress the whole time if you don't get all the things checked off. You got to go to the next attraction to the next attraction. And we got to go get ready for the luau. And if we that would coming in with that mindset, that was one of the things like, okay, maybe we need to tone down the itinerary a little bit and just kind of like that's. One of the things we love about traveling to Hawaii is just kind of being present. There's a lot of definitions for what responsible tourism can be think in this moment. The main thing is supporting those local businesses. Seeking out those local businesses and local artists like yourself is important. Well, Patrick, just to kind of bring everything back into focus, the best way that people one can find you and also to go to the GoFundMe as well.
00:27:56 - Patrick Parker
So find me online. My website is Patrickparkerart.com. And if you look up Facebook or Instagram or anything, it's Patrick Parker Art. And for the GoFundMe to help out artists in Lahaina that need art supplies and to get their careers back going again, would love your help. And the GoFundMe I started is GF me four S, three, three, two R. It'd be a great help. Thank you. Cool.
00:28:31 - Speaker D
Patrick, thank you so much for your time, man.
00:28:33 - Patrick Parker
Right on, Bryan. Appreciate it. Aloha.
00:28:35 - Speaker D
Aloha.
00:28:37 - Bryan Murphy
So again, to go to that GoFundMe that we talked about for the Lahaina artists, you can go to Hawaii's Bestbestravel. Com slash art. And to learn more about Patrick and maybe even to have a piece commissioned by him or to buy a print, you can go to Patrickparkerart.com and be sure to follow this episode on Apple podcasts. Just hit that little follow button, doesn't cost anything. And what it does is when Garen and I record the podcast this Friday, you will get notified as soon as that podcast gets released. So that's important because the stuff that we do talk about in that. Episode will be time sensitive to what the current climate and what is currently happening on Maui, so be sure to stay around for that. And to learn more about what it means to travel with Aloha to Hawaii, you can go to episode 87 of this podcast. To find everything mentioned in today's episode, you can go to Hawaii's Bestbestravel. Com. Episode 10 three all right. Until next time, friends. Be well. Aloha.
00:29:48 - Announcement
Mahalo for listening to this episode of Hawaii's. Best. To stay up to date on future episodes, please subscribe and visit us at Hawaii's best travel.