Francis Haar’s Documentation of a Changing Urban Community
Front cover of the Francis Haar: Disappearing Honolulu exhibit brochure4/30/20: A Preservation Award in Interpretive Media will recognize Francis Haar: Disappearing Honolulu, an exhibit last fall consisting of a film and photographs at the John Young Museum of Art - University of Hawai‘i at Manoa. In the words of exhibit curator Gaye Chan, “Haar’s photographs and film are valuable documents of a not-so-distant past that capture one of Honolulu’s diverse communities in the midst of urban displacement -- a theme that remains relevant today as Honolulu undergoes another period of transformation". In the early 1960s, Hawai‘i had completed urban renewal designation and procedures that would demolish 75 acres encompassing the A‘ala Triangle and areas mauka of North Beretania Street. The redevelopment was named the Kukui District Urban Renewal Project. With demolition scheduled to start in January 1965, a trio rushed to capture on film the community of A‘ala, which until December 1941 had been the center of Honolulu’s Japanese residential community, businesses, and venues for entertainment. The trio was Stephen Bartlett, planner and reporter, Kenneth Bushnell, artist and teacher with a studio on the second floor of the iconic A‘ala Pawn Shop building, and Francis Haar, a photographer and creator of documentaries. They began their filming and documentation in November 1964 and continued through mid-January of the following year. However, due to a shortage of funding, the film was not finished until 1968. As Francis’ son, Tom recounted, “They applied for a grant to then Hawai‘i Governor John Burns who turned them down with a cynical reply as to ‘who would be interested to document this flea-infested section of old Honolulu?’” “It is a fantastic film,” said Chan, “of a style that was [...]
