Superpower Art Lessons

Janet Carafa

Janet is the owner of “In The Light Yoga” located in Princeville, Kauai. She teaches yoga and mime there. Janet also performs and teaches the art of mime as an Artist In The Schools Partner. She taught mime at the Hawaii Children’s Theater for four years and was a lead company member of The American Mime Theatre in NYC for 15 years. Janet studied with the world renowned Marcel Marceau.

Janet believes that mime is full expression from the heart and yoga activates, energizes and revitalizes every system and cell of her body, mind and spirit. She fell in love with movement and the art of mime when she saw Marcel Marceau perform in high-school. Janet has always practiced yoga as the primary way to stay in shape mentally, emotionally and physically to enhance her performance ability.

Art of Mime website
YouTube Channel

Keiki Heroes Superpower
Janet’s superpower is expressing herself with body language from the heart, touching the invisible, and listening to the silence.
Janet wants to share the full expression from the heart with Hawaii’s keiki as we step together into our new world! How do you feel ? Can you express your feelings and share from your heart? Janet wants to empower keiki to express

Brittini Kuwahara

Brittini Kuwahara is a boy-mom of a terrible 3’s toddler, graphic artist by day and an obsessive fiction reader by night. She is currently the Digital Marketing Supervisor for KTA Super Stores, as well as the freelance graphic artist and the illustrator for the locally written book, “I’m a Happy School Bus.” She finds that art is a feeling which you may find transfers into her creations.

Brittini has been interested in art all of her life. Her preferred medium is acrylic painting. She loves that it allows the artist to layer, blend and mix colors to create new shades and hues.

While her career is focused strictly with digital graphics, Brittini paints as a hobby. She gravitates towards art and uses it as an emotional outlet.

Follow her personal IG at @brittkuwainihara

KEIKI HEROES SUPERPOWER
Who would have thought art would be a super power?! Art can mean different things to everyone. Whether you think of art as an experience, a feeling, or an expression art is about capturing a specific moment and being able to share it with others.

For example, with covid, we haven’t been able to go outside or travel. By painting or drawing a picture of a sunny beach, you’re able to capture a memory or place you want to visit. Share that picture with someone and you’ll both be able to live in the artwork you created.

One of Brittini’s favorite parts of mother nature is the sky, and specifically, stars. Hawaiʻi has the most beautiful night skies, filled with stars and the milky way. A starry sky always makes her smile, as she finds it calming and relaxing.

Today, we can use our artistic superpower to capture that feeling and be able to share it!

Brittini chose to participate in Keiki Heroes because she has a keiki of her own!

Jeri Gertz

Jeri has been lucky to call Hilo her home for over forty years.

In 1978, two months after arriving on the island, her composition “Semi-Precious Baby” was chosen to be included on the Homegrown III album. (Now available in free boxes at garage sales everywhere!)

Jeri’s passion for advocacy has inspired her work as a victim counselor for the Sexual Assault Support Service, Prosecutor’s office and for special education students in foster care.

Her love of the performing arts has allowed opportunities for acting, singing and directing in many island productions.

For the past ten years, Jeri has served as director for the choral group Harmony On Tap (known as HOT), a dynamic women’s chorus performing benefit concerts for local charities and social service agencies.

She takes her work seriously and herself lightly. Jeri loves the performing arts. For her, all the world’s a stage. She also loves writing, and the joy of creating a world on the page. She sings and plays music constantly. Jeri looks for the teachable and takeaway moments in life, and tries to be aware that they can happen anywhere.

KEIKI HERO SUPERPOWER
Jeri chose to participate in Keiki Heroes because she is a keiki at heart. She wanted to find ways for her fellow keiki to be healthy and resilient. She looks for the light in even the heaviest of situations. She believes humor and compassion are always in there somewhere. She also loves teamwork, and appreciates input from others to make good ideas even better.

Noelani Isabella Anderson

Noelani Isabella Anderson (Noe) was born and raised on the Island of Hawai’i, where she started dancing at a young age, beginning with Hula Halau Hele le’i Pua O Waipi’o, in Hamakua. She studied theatre and Peace Studies at Chapman University in Southern California, and enjoys all aspects of the performing arts as well as local and global peace building. Noe is a singer/songwriter, actor, dancer, avid traveler, yoga instructor, massage therapist and surfer. She first became interested in art at three years old when she first began dancing Hula and her preferred medium is stage performance, because it is alive!

Noe teaches Musical Theatre at Prince Dance Institute where she also enjoys writing original shows for the Institute’s annual performances. She also practices other creative arts such as writing, painting, and dancing in her daily routines to keep her mental health top shape.

Noe is the Peer Mediation Coordinator at West Hawai’i Mediation Center, where she strives to find creative ways to bring peace building work into the classroom. She loves collaborating with fellow artists to use theatre to teach a variety of concepts including language, civics, international relations and peace building.

KEIKI HEROES
Noe chose to participate in the Keiki Heroes because she loves the initiative of Keiki Heroes! She loves how the organization has taken a difficult situation and circumstance (covid), and found creative ways to get keiki and community members passionate about taking care of one another and embracing our kuleana to nourish a healthy community via art, music and other resources. Her superpower is her ability to find the silver lining in situations.

You can find some of her work at the instagram accounts @prince_dance_institute and @westhawaiimediation

Dani Preston

Dani Preston is a collage and multimedia artist, musician, poet and educator on the Big lsland. Born in California, she has since taught youth and created art in France and Hawaiʻi. Currently she is teaching art lessons to youth as an introduction to the diversity of mediums which they may express themselves through. Working with youth in a creative language feels symbiotic and enriching as expression and inquisition facilitate crucial critical thinking skills. Wonder, emotional awareness, observation and creativity are values in people which she believes every child should be exposed to as a  benefit to their wellbeing and for the advancement of their communities.

KEIKI HEROES
Dani’s superpower is gratitude because she transforms all situations, good or bad, into learning experiences which she is able to grow from. She creates art as a sacred expression of the abstract ideas and deep emotions she experiences. Sometimes her ideas cannot satisfyingly fit into a structured language or cohesive explanation, so the action of pursuing a very meaningful thought or feeling results in art. Teaching art through different mediums and through observational awareness is her way of inspiring others to navigate their own personal expressions and to play with their own perspectives.

Dani teamed up with Keiki Heroes because keiki are her everyday heroes and influencers. She strongly believes in the dreams, potential and individuality found in every child. As part of this community, she feels the responsibility to provide her support as a role model for our keiki to feel seen and encouraged to become their truest, brightest selves.

messyfreckles.org

Bonnie Sol 

For over 20 years, Bonnie Sol’s breathtaking oils have been inspired by nature.

Even as a child, growing up on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi, you could find her either outdoors or in her room, drawing the world around her on sketch pads. Since then, no matter where Bonnie has made her home, nature has continued to be her inspiration.

Bonnie Sol grew up on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi, inspired by the world around her. She attended high school in the U.S. Virigin Islands and graduated from Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts (BA in Anthropology), and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston (BFA with concentration in Painting).

Bonnie has been interested in art since childhood. She loves nature and wants to depict what she sees. Her preferred medium for professional work is oil paint. She loves the buttery consistency of the paint, especially while blending colors on the canvas. For enjoyment, she really likes teaching with acrylics. She has a home art studio in Hilo, Hawaiʻi out of which she works and teaches. She also provides private home lessons and group paint events. She has artwork shown in seven galleries island wide.

KEIKI HEROES
Bonnie’s superpower is creativity and making art. She can sketch at a rapid pace, bring nature to life on a canvas and has the power to facilitate a creative space so other people can learn and do art.

Bonnie loves teaching kids with art and knows the importance of positive informative outlets for parents and kids.

www.bonniesol.com
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Therese Uyetake

Therese Uyetake is an art teacher at E.B. de Silva Elementary School. She was born and raised in Hilo, Hawai’i and received her educational degree from the University of Hawai’i at Hilo. When not instructing children at school, Therese enjoys gardening, art and completing crafts at home. She also enjoys baking for family and friends.

As a child, Therese always enjoyed participating in art contests and art classes. When the opportunity to become the art teacher at E.B. deSilva presented itself, she gladly took on the role to share her love of art with the students.

Her preferred medium is oil pastels. Oil pastels can be applied in many ways and the outcome will be beautiful however it is used. She practices in the comfort of her office at E.B. deSilva Elementary. The quietness of her room helps her to plan her activities for her students. It also provides the space needed for the many supplies artists use.

KEIKI HEROES
Therese chose to participate in Keiki Heroes to share her love of art with the many children who may not currently have the opportunity in their schools to learn and create art. Therese’s superpower is baking. She loves to treat her family and friends to delicious goodies.