Lāhainā Think Space set for gathering Sept. 18 in New York City

Lāhainā Think Space will go on the road to New York City for an event on Sept. 18, marking the first time the Think Space experience extends beyond Hawaiʻi to a national audience, according to an announcement. The event is being organized through a collaboration of Maui County, Maui Public Arts Corps and New York University.

Prompted by an invitation from the Hawaiʻi Club at NYU, the Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU and the Center for Collaborative Indigenous Research with Communities and Lands (Center CIRCL), the day-long campus experience recognizes that those who carry memories of Lahaina across oceans remain an essential part of the community’s story and of the ongoing conversations about how communities remember and honor the more than 100 lives lost in the Aug. 8, 2023 Maui wildfires.

The event is timed to coincide with the beginning of NYU’s academic year, the university’s 2026 “Oceans” theme and the 25th anniversary of Sept. 11. “The gathering creates a meaningful bridge between Hawaiʻi and New York,” the announcement says. “Through public dialogue, community storytelling and film, participants will explore how communities remember after tragedy, how stories travel across generations and geography, and how listening can shape meaningful acts of remembrance and community-centered memorialization grounded in lived experience.”

The day will feature Listening Across Oceans: Story, Memory, and the Making of Memorials, an interdisciplinary panel bringing together artists, cultural practitioners, students, government leaders and museum professionals to discuss how community voice can inform collective remembrance, public memory and approaches to memorialization. That evening, audiences will experience the Hui Moʻolelo: Lāhainā Film Showcase, a collection of animated short films inspired by intergenerational talk-story recordings with Lahaina residents and their loved ones, transforming memories of place, family, humor, culture and belonging into moving works of art.

“Part of my job now is not just rebuilding a town for economic development, but to restore hope for the community,” said Erin Wade, Maui County deputy managing director. “We are focusing on the things that brought joy and connection to ensure the continuation of life can happen. I would invite all of you to engage with us as we continue to reshape, remember and rebuild the Lahaina that each and every one of us loves and collectively wants to share with the world.”

“Our work exploring community-centered memorialization in Lāhainā has been strengthened by the generosity of communities that have walked this path before us,” said Kelly White, founder and chair of Maui Public Art Corps and administrator of the County of Maui Public Art Program. “Over the past year, the National September 11 Memorial & Museum has shared invaluable insight from its own experience stewarding memory, loss, and public dialogue. As New York marks the 25th anniversary of Sept. 11, we come not only to share Lahaina’s stories, but to listen, to learn, and to honor the profound responsibility of creating places of remembrance that are shaped first by the people they serve.”

“For us to take this all the way to you folks in New York City, this is a first for us,” said Sissy Lake-Farm, cultural consultant for the County of Maui Public Art Program. “Having you consider us and wanting to be part of this feels very appropriate. We are honoring and looking at the diaspora because their connectivity and opinions matter.”

“Any excuse to help Hawaiʻi come to New York is a valuable opportunity,” said Pua Farm, president of the NYU Hawaiʻi Club. “The Hawaiian community at NYU is so tight, and this project is so gorgeous because it helps us stay connected to our roots and who we are even when we are across the ocean.”

“This activation creates a meaningful bridge between Hawaiʻi and New York,” said Amita Manghnani, associate director of NYU’s Asian/Pacific/American Institute. “It is an opportunity to explore how storytelling helps communities remember, heal and imagine meaningful forms of remembrance grounded in lived experience.”

The collaboration also reflects an ongoing exchange between Maui and organizations that have navigated their own journeys of remembrance. Leaders from the National September 11 Memorial & Museum have shared insights with Maui County and Maui Public Art Corps as they explore community-centered approaches to remembrance, offering lessons from preserving memory, stewarding community dialogue and developing places of public remembrance.

“I am really impressed and in awe of how attentively you are integrating the community,” said Amy Weinstein, vice president for Oral History and Museum Collections at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum. “You are genuinely starting with the community, whereas for us, that was a decision we had to come to later. You’re already partway there.”

While rooted in the story of Lahaina, the Sept. 18 gathering also asks universal questions: How do communities remember? Who carries memory across generations and geography? And how can artists, institutions and community members work together to create places that honor both loss and life? By bringing these conversations to one of the world’s leading universities, Maui County, Maui Public Art Corps and NYU hope to deepen understanding of community-centered memorialization while fostering dialogue among students, scholars, artists and communities about the role storytelling plays in carrying memory across generations and place.

The public is invited to attend both the daytime panel discussion at NYU (20 Cooper Square) and the evening Hui Moʻolelo: Lāhainā Film Showcase at MoMA (11 West 53rd street). Admission is free, but advance RSVP is required for admission. To RSVP and find full event information, visit mauipublicart.org/nyu.