Yesterday we posted about the arrival of seven vaka, Polynesian voyaging canoes, in Hilo, Hawaii. This seems an appropriate time to remember Herb Kawainui Kāne, an Hawaiian artist, historian and one of the founders of the Polynesian Voyaging Society, who died last March at the age of 82. Kāne was also one of the designers of the Hōkūleʻa, a double-hulled voyaging canoe, built by the the Polynesian Voyaging Society. In 1976, the Hōkūleʻa sailed from Hawaii to Tahiti using only Polynesian navigation techniques without modern navigational instruments.
This month, Honolulu Magazine looked back on the life of Herb Kawainui Kāne, who they had only interviewed months before. They called Kāne “one of the principal figures of the Hawaiian Renaissance, that resurgence of Hawaiian culture that began in the 1970s and culminated in the rebirth of hula, the Hawaiian language, traditional Hawaiian music, Hawaiian voyaging canoes, and a growing sense of Hawaiian social and political identity.”