Shangri La Museum of Islamic Art, Culture & Design and Ballet Hawaiʻi recently announced a partnership that supports youth in West Oʻahu.
Through the partnership, Doris Duke Foundation Shangri La will provide five scholarships to students at Ballet Hawaiʻi West, as well as an investment in the dance school's infrastructure. The exact amount of the investment was not disclosed.
Located in Kāhala, Shangri La is a former home of tobacco heiress Doris Duke, which has been turned into an oceanside museum of Islamic art. It is also a center of the Doris Duke Foundation, which works to build a better future through its support of arts and culture, nature, and health and well-being, according to its website.
Ballet Hawaiʻi dedicated two studios at the campus in Waipahu to Doris Duke Foundation Shangri La on Friday, April 17, Richard Vida, executive director of Ballet Hawaiʻi, told Aloha State Daily on Wednesday.
The investment includes a grant to help enhance the sound system at Ballet Hawaiʻi West, along with five $1,000 student scholarships to that location, he said. Ballet Hawaiʻi has locations in Honolulu and Waipahu.
"It's going to open so many doors and allow so many of our young dancers the opportunity to train and grow and belong to our Ballet Hawaiʻi community, so we're very excited about that," Vida told ASD.
Students from Ballet Hawaiʻi performed at Shangri La as part of the unveiling of the museum’s updated living room space on Tuesday, April 21. That room was originally kept much as it was when Doris Duke lived there. But the space now does not have the original large sofa, which has been replaced with cushions and chairs that the public can sit on, making the room a gathering place for conversations and events, rather than a space visitors walk through.
“The reimagining of the living room really came from this idea of maximizing our campus,” Ben Weitz, executive director for Shangri La, told ASD at the event. “And so, what we realized is that when guests were visiting, they only got to be shuttled through. And they couldn't really be immersed in the space and enjoy the objects and architecture.”
Other arts and cultural organizations and nonprofits had shared that there are limited spaces to meet for important conversations and performance, Weitz added.
“We looked here in our own backyard and thought, 'Wow, what if we actually reimagined our living room as a place to convene?” he said. “We're really excited to be able to activate the space with a local organization, especially drafting off of our announcement last Friday where we made a grant to Ballet Hawaiʻi West to support scholarships and their investment needs for Ballet Hawaiʻi West in Waipahu.”
Weitz hopes the partnership will bring new visitors to Shangri La.
“We look forward to making this a multi-year investment in arts and culture communities here, specifically on the West Side, where many folks — the closest they might ever get to Shangri La is seeing the studio that we sponsored — but we hope it's bringing them a step closer to the Shangri La that hopefully they will visit in person here in Kāhala,” he said.
Shangri La does not keep the profits of its ticket sales. Instead, after costs are met, the proceeds of tours directly support HoMA and Bishop Museum.
Tickets are $20 for kamaʻāina for Thursday or Friday tours, which depart from HoMA, and $25 for Saturday tours, which depart from Bishop Museum. Tickets release at 10 a.m. on the first Thursday of each month. Details.
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Katie Helland can be reached at katie@alohastatedaily.com.
