These and other ideas about the place of rice in Asian culture were the focus of a six-year effort by UCLA's Fowler Museum of Cultural History, culminating in 2003 in a panoramic exhibit, "The Art of Rice: Spirit and Sustenance in Asia." The exhibit travels to Honolulu next month for a nine-week run in the Henry R. Luce Gallery at the Honolulu Academy of Arts.

In celebration of this exhibit, which is expected to speak eloquently to Islanders, The Advertiser, in partnership with the academy, is sponsoring an essay contest on the theme, "The Island Art of Rice."

In keeping with the wide-ranging nature of the exhibit — which encompasses rice as sustenance not just of a physical kind but also as a linchpin of cultural and religious practices in many Asian cultures — essays can range from memory to history, fact to fiction, prose, even poetry. Recall Obachan's special New Year's sushi, or reflect on a moonlit evening of sake and toasting. Write an ode to plate lunch or to your first bowl of phô (Vietnamese rice noodle soup).

Submit your essay on or before Feb. 4; three winning essays will be published in The Advertiser Island Life section Feb. 20.

A glance at the telephone-book-size "The Art of Rice" catalog is sufficient to reveal the scope of this exhibit. The catalog, like the show itself, is developed thematically, with sections on "Labor, Ritual and the Cycle of Time," "The Granery: A Home for the Rice Spirits," "Rice Cycle Festival: Community and Celebration," "The Goddess of Rice," "Sacred Food," "Straw Matters," "Rice as Self, Rice as Nation" and "The Future of Rice."

Honolulu Academy of Arts director Stephen Little, who saw "The Art of Rice" at the Fowler Museum last year, said the exhibit is about "the place where the human realm and the divine realm come together in the rice field — rice as a kind of glue that holds the community together. " It ranges from 10th century B.C. artifacts to videos of contemporary rice festivals.

It will be an eye-opener for Islanders who think of rice as something everyday, to be picked up in yellow bags at the supermarket or ordered in a Zippy's plate lunch. "I think people will be surprised to see how complex the world of rice is, the rituals and different ceremonies and beliefs that are involved in getting the rice there," he said.

Little said the exhibit is highly approachable: "Anyone who eats rice will get this show," he said.

Honolulu was one of the first places to be offered the show because recently retired academy director George Ellis has strong ties to the Fowler. The academy is the third stop on the exhibit's itinerary. It traveled to Napa Valley's Copia: The American Center for Wine, Food and the Arts before coming here.