WIP Pa u Naia Alii

WIP WIP WIP

May be recognized from the sketch located back in the gallery... Im playing with her in Corel Painter.

This is a costume study design for my riding school's ceremonial presentations. The design incorperates a number of mythological connectons; the skirt and sleeves are designed to resemble a Datura/Brugmansia (ANGLE'S TRUMPET) flower, which have a deliriant/halleucenogenic quality and were a key ingredient in the rituals that allowed witches "to fly without wings" (which take on a dual meaning as anyone familiar with Arabian horse legends will recognize that the Arabian horse is said to have been made of a hand full of desert sand that God blew across to provide mankind a means of "flying without wings") The skirts are also important as it is a Hawaiian tradition of "Pa'u" riding among women, in the days of early hawaiian colonization by European/Americans, the horse took on a special place here, and the ladies of the royal court would ride in their full ceremonial Pa'u (skirts)

The skirt also has a special meaning here, and is given its blue and white color because it is connected to the story both of the isle on which I reside, as well as to two of the most important Hawaiian goddesses, before they were goddesses. And that story tells of a little nameless vine that grows along the beaches here and is covered in blue or white flowers. When Pele first came to the Islands, and her sister/daughter Hi'iaka was still an infant, Pele left her inthe vines on the beach while she had to attend a very long and boring ceremonial greeting and pedigree chant (tradition to anyone new meeting the current cheifs), Hiiaka was in danger of being burned by the sun, so the vine grew up and covered her with its blooms, and when Pele returned to collect the infant, the vines came free and fell about the infant like a skirt. The only favor the Vine and her friend he shrub asked in return was that the vine be given a name, for it did not yet have one. So Pele named her Pa'u o Hi'iaka (the skirt of Hi'iaka)

There is a great deal more behind the ideas of this, but its still a WIP. I have already designed and performed in a very similar Rose pink version of this, but this is the sigature garment of the riders from my academy. And our signature Nai'a Horses.