UH Maui College receives unique ‘Maui Sugar – the Twilight Years’ art collection

University of Hawai‘i Maui College has received a stunning art collection titled “Maui Sugar – the Twilight Years.” The gift, totaling 39 works, comes from long-time Kā‘anapali resident Jo Rockwell. Her prized collection is comprised of paintings by local artists and is believed to be the largest private collection of “sugar art.”

Originally, the collection was meant to come to the college when Rockwell either passed away or was no longer able to live in her home. She had to evacuate from that home twice during last August’s Lahaina wildfires and so decided it was time for the paintings to be moved to UHMC. The entire collection is now on permanent display in the Pā’ina Building.

As a young woman, Rockwell was interested in industrial art. And that interest grew when she moved to Maui and became familiar with the old sugar mills.

“One day in 2005, I walked over to the Village Gallery (in Lahaina) and was struck to my bones by a pastel painting of the Puʻunēnē Mill by Stephen Burr. Even though I was unable to purchase that particular painting it was the beginning of a passion that lasted the rest of my life,” said Rockwell.

“I purchased my first painting in this collection in January 2006. It’s a large oil painting of the Pioneer Mill in Lahaina by Uri Blayer of Israel. I first met him at the Village Gallery on a day when his picture had appeared in The Maui News of him riding his bicycle down to Kahului from Makawao with a very large painting under his arm. It may have been the first painting of his that I bought.”

“This collection is so special and so powerful because it represents a history that so many of our students are connected to in one way or another, but may not know much about since the plantations closed,” said Jocelyn Romero Demirbag Director of Development, Maui Nui. “In that way, UHMC is an ideal location for the collection which is educational as well as personal history for so many in our community.”