Artwork offers a journey for the mind

Catching TheBus at the new Wahiawa Transit Center is part daily commute and part time travel thanks to muralist Solo­mon Enos and his team of young artist helpers.

Honolulu’s Commission on Culture and the Arts posted a request for art to adorn the new $5.56 million, 46,000-square-foot park-and-ride bus facility on Cali­for­nia Avenue in Wahiawa. Enos submitted a bid and was awarded the contract in early 2013.

"I knew the story to tell and how to tell it, but not just me telling — the story belongs to the community," he said.

And, in his usual mode, he designed a plan to include young artists from a Leilehua High School art class run by teacher Larry Taguba.

Enos got creative with launching the project even before funds were released.

"We had the gig and the plan for the student participation, and the kids were ready," Enos said, so they dug up "self-funding," allowing students to paint during the spring while school was still in session.

His design told epic stories on 4-by-4-foot panels that were enlarged to 36-by-36 and outlined on canvas.

The first image on canvas, "Wa Po‘e, the Time of the People," was permanently adhered to the concrete wall. Enos began painting in place, using tall ladders. It took him 100 hours to bring the images to life, assisted by a dozen emerging artists from Lana Lane Studios in Kaka­ako.

The second 36-by-36 canvas was cut into 4-by-4-foot panels for the Leilehua students to paint at school. These were reassembled in random order on the concrete wall. Titled "Wa Papa," the work has the look of a kapa pattern with a hidden landscape.

Enos said that when the 20 young artists — who had worked 100 student hours to produce the work — arrived on site, it was "a moment of total pride when they saw their art installed."

Working from early in the day to late into the night, Enos discussed his project with passers-by.

"I told them what we were doing, they gave us ‘the look.’ I asked what they thought and got another look," he recalled.

Eventually, after seeing Enos working night after night, those same people "began to talk, to ask what the mural meant, and then told me stories and legends their grandpas told them."

Enos employs a process that mixes inspiration with myth, legend and history to produce what he calls "portals" where time travel seems not only possible, but within the realm of everyone’s reality. It’s a bit like his well-read former newspaper comic strip, "Polyfantastica," or the more realistic depiction of legend in the centennial edition of "The Epic Tale of Hi‘iakaikapoli­o­pele," translated by Puakea Nogelmeier.

Telling stories of place, Enos has islands erupting from the bottom of the sea and dynamic arrivals of both gods and mortals. At the Royal Hawaiian Center, he created block-long murals to face east and west, like portals into the ancient past in each direction.

"East is the view about 800 years ago; looking west is looking back 500 years," he said.

Reared in Makaha Valley, Enos is the son of Eric Enos, founder of Ka‘ala Farm and its Cultural Learning Center in Wai­anae. Solo­mon Enos received his first mural commission as a sixth-grader at Makaha Elementary.

Collaborations with other Hawaiian artists and students include the 80-foot mural at the Hawai‘i Convention Center, a 72-foot mural of Helumoa for the Sheraton Waikiki Hotel, a 250-foot wall mural of the stream near Kalihi Waena School, Pow! Wow! Hawai‘i street murals and the 3-D "‘Anu‘u Nu‘u Ka‘ike" mural for Pacific Hall at Bishop Museum. He’s also produced murals at Sea Life Park, Howard Hughes Corp. and Aulani, a Disney Resort.

Enos’ team of artists and students, and anyone within earshot, is immediately transported whenever the artist pauses, mid-brush stroke, to tell a story.

"My hope is that they have positive thoughts about art and maybe more pride in the community that hosts the art," he said.