KAILUA-KONA — Martin Charlot’s first step off the plane was a step through time.
The artist and author slept on picnic tables in public parks in the Puna District when he was 18. The state commissioned a massive mural for what is now known as the Ellison Onizuka Gymnasium at Konawaena High School from Charlot in his 30s. And now, in the heart of his 70s, Charlot has returned at the behest of the school to replicate what he captured on canvas more than four decades ago — legacy, community and history of place.
More than five months in, Charlot regards the monumental task an honor and a responsibility. But traveling back to an island full of personal history he’s called home more than once to recreate a seminal piece of his life’s collection makes the work more than just those things.
It’s become an emotional journey of a distinctly circular quality, conjuring lost faces of both the vital and hand-drawn varieties, and reconnecting a man late in years with who he was at an influential point in his past.
“A lot of my life is mixed up in this mural,” Charlot said as rain poured down outside the open carport in South Kona serving as his studio. “I had some very personal things that happened while I was doing the mural, things that changed my life completely. Like my wife leaving me … and raising four kids on my own.”
“When you paint something, you’re touching it,” he continued. “Your feelings are very real. You become very involved in it. The emotions do flood back as you’re working, as you touch the board and touch the moment of what was happening when you first painted it. You remember all of that.”
Now requiring either a wheelchair or walker, and also down the sight in his right eye, three of Charlot’s children have spent stints on the island helping their father paint from scratch 38 plastic/fiberglass panels, each 4 feet wide and 5 feet, 3 inches high.
Charlot has also enlisted help from fellow artists, like Oahu’s Calvin Ho who is portrayed in the mural along with his son, along with friends, namely Rosa and Marcelino Sanchez, who have been with Charlot since he arrived in December.
Rosa has been Charlot’s caregiver for more than 15 years and manages the mural’s joints, the areas where panels connect, scaling scaffolding and touching up the barriers until they’re invisible. Her husband, Marcelino, sanded the panels and has also assisted with the painting.
“It’s a big labor,” said Charlot, who spends 10 hours daily brush-in-hand. “It’s a huge mural, and I want to make it as least as good as I did the first time. But I’m even wanting to make it better.”
Shawn Suzuki, principal at Konawaena High School and author of the effort to restore Charlot’s work rather than discard it, believes the value of the end product will exceed the cost of time, money and effort on the part of everyone involved.
“That mural was up there over 40 years and in such a state of disrepair that so many details were lost,” Suzuki said. “It’s not like you could really stand there and look at the mural and tease out the images there or make connections to it. But now, you’re not going to be able to miss it.”
