HAPPENING TODAY: Walter Dods, Jr. RISE Center grand opening, Bumpei Akaji sculpture dedication

For media planning to attend, please RSVP to Marc Arakaki at marcra@hawaii.edu. Parking is available on the UH Mānoa campus. Suggested areas to park are near the Shidler College of Business and School of Architecture, and walk across University Avenue to RISE. Interviews will be available upon request.

WHAT: The University of Hawaiʻi Foundation and UH Mānoa are hosting a dedication event for a newly installed Bumpei Akaji sculpture in front of the Walter Dods, Jr. RISE Center and grand opening celebration for the center. 

WHERE: The Walter Dods, Jr. RISE Center at 1810 University Avenue on the corner of University Avenue and Metcalf Street.

WHEN: Saturday, June 15

• 10 a.m.–approx.10:30 a.m.: Sculpture dedication ceremony 
• 11:30 a.m. - 12:15 p.m.: Walter Dods, Jr. RISE Center grand opening
• 12:15 p.m.: Reception and tours 

WHO: Gov. Josh Green, Walter Dods Jr., Jay H. Shidler, UH President David Lassner, UH Provost Michael Bruno, UH Vice President and UH Foundation CEO Tim Dolan, UH Mānoa Shidler College of Business Dean Vance Roley and UH Mānoa Pacific Asian Center for Entrepreneurship Executive Director Sandra Fujiyama

Bumpei Akaji sculpture dedication ceremony

UH Mānoa alumni Walter Dods, Jr. and Jay H. Shidler have gifted a sculpture by the late Bumpei Akaji back to their alma mater. The sculpture was created in 1979 by Kauaʻi-born Akaji as a gift for the late Masaru “Pundy” Yokouchi, founding chairperson of Hawaiʻi’s State Foundation on Culture and the Arts. Dods and Shidler purchased the sculpture from Yokouchi’s estate and named it “RISE” with permission from Yokouchi’s family. 

Walter Dods, Jr. RISE Center grand opening

The RISE building was named for Dods in honor of his gift of $5 million, which supports RISE programs operated by the Pacific Asian Center for Entrepreneurship at the UH Mānoa Shidler College of Business. The student entrepreneurship and innovation center with housing for 374 students opened in August 2023. UH Foundation recently moved its headquarters to the second and third floors of the Charles Atherton House at RISE. The grand opening is being held after the entire complex, including the renovation of the Charles Atherton House, was completed. RISE was built under a public-private partnership between UH, UH Foundation and Hunt Companies Hawai‘i. 

More about Akaji

Bumpei Akaji was one of seven local artists who attended UH Mānoa after World War II and lived at the “Metcalf Chateau,” an old house on Metcalf Street they rented in the 1950s, near the Walter Dods, Jr. RISE Center. Akaji, who was a member of the famed 442nd Regimental Combat Team during the war, stayed in Italy to study painting and sculpture before returning to attend UH and became one of the first to earn a master’s in fine arts degree from UH Mānoa in 1952. 

More about the Walter Dods, Jr. RISE Center

The $70 million live-learn-work Walter Dods, Jr. RISE Center opened to the first UH student residents in August 2023. It was the first new UH student housing facility in 15 years, successfully repurposing the landmark 1930s Charles Atherton House building into a state-of-the-art modern institutional facility flanked by two new six-story student residential wings. The first-of-its-kind entrepreneurship-and-innovation center for Hawaiʻi is located on the corner of Metcalf Street and University Avenue at the flagship UH Mānoa campus.