Hiko Hanapi stands in the center of a tent on the grounds of the Hawai'i State Art Museum on Keiki Art Day, holding up a silkscreen frame and repeating the story of the pueo, the Hawaiian owl.

He tells of a time when the owl was a common sight on O'ahu and several aunties gathered around the tables nod silently in agreement. But the pueo, which lays its eggs on the ground, is rarely seen on O'ahu anymore, he says. He lays the frame on a child's T-shirt, slaps down a squeegee, dispersing the ink, and leans in close to the child's head. He repeats the child's name, pulling the squeegee across the print, preserving the story of the pueo one T-shirt at a time.

This free workshop at Keiki Art Day is just a small piece in a larger vision. Hanapi is one of several artists participating in Maoli Arts Month, or MAMo, which culminates April 1 and 2 at the First Annual Native Hawaiian Arts Market at the Bishop Museum. According to Noelle M.K.Y. Kahanu, project manager at the Bishop Museum. Hanapi played a large part in getting MAMo and the market started.

"Hiko has been talking about this market for at least 10 years," Kahanu says.

The Native Hawaiian Arts Market went from inspiration to plan after the Bishop Museum sponsored six Hawaiian artists to visit the Santa Fe Indian Market last August, Kahanu says. The 85-year-old annual event draws more than 100,000 visitors and represents works by more than 700 artists.

"We got back from Santa Fe, and everyone said, 'OK, we have to do this,' " Kahanu says. "This is our first effort, but this is where we are heading. We want Hawaiian visual artists to take their appropriate place among and within the arts community."

Bob Freitas, one of the artists on the New Mexico trip, agrees. Freitas, who has exhibited his sculptures internationally, says that contemporary Hawaiian artists have struggled long enough.

"We should be celebrating contemporary native art around the globe," Freitas says. "I'd been to Santa Fe in the past, and I was always amazed. Their sculptures sell for $25,000, and we come back here and we have a hard time, in a gallery setting, selling for $4,000 or $5,000. ... We need to get the patrons to understand the value of Hawaiian art. It's a living and constantly evolving culture."

"There's a disconnect between appreciation and funding for our Native Hawaiian artists and arts community," says kumu hula and PA'I Foundation president Vicky Holt Takamine, who helped write the $20,000 grant to start the market and MAMo events.

While the market was the initial emphasis for the grant, Takamine and others wanted to expand the exposure, to create more than a two-day vehicle for Hawaiian art and artists. They approached The ARTS at Marks Garage, which agreed to put on the "It's Na'au or Newa" show, which features the work of 16 artists through Saturday. Nine downtown venues, including Louis Pohl Gallery and Pegge Hopper Gallery, are showcasing Hawaiian artists in conjunction with the event. MAMo organized the free Keiki Art Day, and later this month, the group will honor six Hawaiian artists, including Herb Kane and Rocky Jensen, in an awards ceremony.

"What was going to be a two-day event turned into a two-week event, and now it's a monthlong event," Takamine says.

The exposure has generated excitement within the community, Takamine says. But it's the outsiders, the patrons, that organizers want to court.

"You know, everyone knows hula. The world knows hula. But when we talk about our visual arts. ... We want people to come to Hawai'i for this. To come to the museum, and be willing to pay the prices our artists deserve," Kahanu says.

For Hanapi, the market is a long time coming, but it's only a part of what he envisions for Native Hawaiian artists. He sees a discipline-based Native Hawaiian arts school for post-secondary education, a place where Hawaiian artists learn, teach and exchange ideas; where other native cultures can lecture and share their experiences. Rather than ghettoize budding Hawaiian artists, the school would bring a cultural element to the artistic process.

"We can do our art (independently), but we need to prepare our people to do Hawaiian art," Hanapi says, who is president of the nonprofit Keomailani Hanapi Foundation, which last year sponsored a discussion on the topic.

"(The market) is a beginning," says Hanapi. "It shows community partnership and provides economic opportunity."

The buzz created, however, captures the spirit of this first MAMo, Kahanu says. "We had one young man who said: This shouldn't be MAMo, Maoli Arts Month; this should be MAMo, Maoli Arts Movement, because it's our time."

Sue Kiyabu is a freelance writer based in Honolulu.