At the KPMG USP 2025 Open Day earlier this month, the Oceania Centre for Arts, Culture and Pacific Studies (OCACPS) placed creativity and imagination at the forefront of the student experience.
Inside USP’s iconic Molikilagi Bure at Laucala Campus in Suva stood a large white display board, a blank canvas, and a colourful palette of acrylic paints—an open invitation for creative expression. This interactive display complemented the other vibrant OCACPS programmes and activities, including Pacific Studies, Oceania Dance Theatre, Niusounds Band, Pasifika Voices Choir, and various music and dance classes.
The vision of OCACPS Director, Dr Katrina Talei Igglesden, was that this blank canvas would come alive through the creativity of both renowned Red Wave Collective artist Ledua Peni and visiting high school students.
Guided by talanoa (dialogue) in the bure, the artwork reflected the vibrancy and diversity of Pacific voices expressed through a range of visual art styles.
“It is so exciting that this beautiful artwork has been born out of the creativity of world-renowned artist Ledua Peni and future USP students. In secondary school settings, the focus is often on academic achievement. But there is so much opportunity and potential in the arts and in creativity. Having that outlet to create and engage your imagination helps you in your academic life as well. This is so important to share with our future Pacific leaders,” said Dr Igglesden.
Students were invited to contribute to the painting alongside Peni. Starting with just two colours, he gradually added and exchanged hues until the canvas came alive in USP’s school colours. Each student spent about a minute painting a line here, a motif there, and collectively created a tapestry that symbolised teamwork.
“This piece came from the students’ ideas. I just controlled them with the colours. So, from all those small ideas, just from the conversations in this room, you get what is drawn within these borders. The composition on Open Day was all about your joy, all about your goals and how you can bridge from secondary to university level. From those ideas, to come up with this, it’s like a journey,” Peni added.
“Making this painting had been a journey, and it also depicted a journey: the journey that students would make to reach USP and the journey that they would take to complete their time at university. There may have been challenges such as those illustrated in the painting of the person paddling and encountering turtles, birds and other obstacles across the ocean that connects us but, as the artwork suggested, one has to paddle their own way through them and, when they do, they emerge stronger for it.”
Aptly titled The Journey, the artwork is now hung in the entry foyer of OCACPS, where it is available for all to view and admire.
Each year, a new collaborative artwork will join this one, creating a legacy of student creativity.
