PUNA ART COLLECTIVE – Beltane Art Show in Pahoa

Celebrating an ancient Celtic festival on May Day. 
May 3rd-4th, 2024
Review and Photos By Raydiance Joy Grace

The “Pop-Up Art Show” was inspired by Laurie Bauers who wanted to bring the community together to share the art they have been creating since the winter solstice. The Puna Art Collective presented the exhibition above the Electric Jungle Tattoo Shop as a stunning, vibrant showing of many local artists. Walking up the steps to the gallery, I was met by a display of eclectic art from many different traditions, including pure Hawaiian nature and animals, mythological mermaids, lovers in Lemurian landscapes, goddesses imbued in esoteric Hindu symbols from the artist’s imagination. 

Kudos to Reyn Grillo and Laurie Bauers for their hard work in spontaneously mounting this show and being the primary foundation of the Puna Art Collective. The mission of the Puna Art Collective is to keep the art in Puna alive and to support any artists who are up and coming and want to have their work seen. Reyn hosts a weekly Sunday Art Day for artists who want to get together with their art project,  feel connected, and socialize in the garden at the Mystic Closet.

Along with ten artists, the collective was started in 2019 with the practice of life drawing with models. In 2020, they opened a gallery storefront in Pahoa during the pandemic, which later moved across the street and became the Electric Jungle Tattoo. The Puna Art Collective continues to support local artists by showing all the paintings on exhibit during the Beltane show in the lobby of the Electric Jungle Tattoo shop. Last year both Reyn and Laurie were selected by the Visionary Art Intensive at the Chapel of Sacred Mirrors in New York. The intensive is facilitated by Alex and Allyson Grey, including some of today’s most influential famous artists.

Laurie started painting this portrait of Pele in 2018 before the Lava flow and finished it the day the lava emerged. At the initial showing of this painting, no one came because they were busy evacuating their homes! Laurie regards this as a prophetic portrait of Pele; Laurie is  very cautious about how she depicts Pele when she decides to paint her again.

Wildlife artist Vincent Callagher came to Hawaii and fell in love with the Big Island and has resided here for over 25 years. He is now taking the skills he learned from painting the High Sierras, coast and wildlife of California and is applying his unique use of watercolors and pen and ink to this tropical paradise. Vincent works out of his studio, painting and teaching pen and ink and watercolor on the Big Island of Hawaii.

in water color

“Sooooo I’ve been quiet about my SoulKeepers series of paintings I’ve been working on because the series keeps growing & growing and growing! … and this journey of visual meditations is unlike anything I’ve created before~ I now have over 40 of them in the works.”

Archangel Michael appeared to the artist Anastasia in a vision. “He wanted me to paint a blessing for the world to create peace and truth as in the sword of truth following God’s truth, which is love. The blue in the painting represents the divine messenger of love and protection over the world. It is a prayer of unity, unifying the world

“Restraint and Revolution” the work of Rose Adare, is a remarkable series of 25 biographical paintings conceived through interviews and photographs of contemporary individuals who essentially are redefining what it means to be human by stretching what identity, gender, sex and body enhancement mean in the twenty-first century and beyond.

Reyn and Laurie are in the process of forming a non-profit 501c3 to establish a self-sustaining community, House of  Creative Visions, based on local agriculture, creative endeavors including music, fine arts, education, Hawaiian cultural studies and spiritual wellness. If you feel called to participate or support their dreams please contact: 

[email protected] or call Electric Jungle Tattoo 808 430-1027