Before murals occupied walls in Hawai‘i, art was limited for kids growing up on O‘ahu. In the 1980s, Jasper Wong was considered an outcast: a creative child drawn to cartoons and comic books, coming of age at a time when art programs for young artists were scarce. If any existed, his single mother, who ran a grocery store in Kalihi, didn’t know where to find them.
But she encouraged him to pursue his passion anyway. That support led him to the Academy of Arts in San Francisco for college, where he found acceptance in a creative community for the first time.
For many budding creatives like him, opportunities were rare on the islands. So, when Jasper eventually became a professional artist, he set out to change that…