The Schaefer Portrait Challenge 2012 is one of the most popular art shows in Hawaii, with good reason. It’s full of talent and variety, a riveting show that dives deeply into human emotion.

It’s all about love and respect, captured by 57 artists on six islands. The 59 works are fashioned in oil, acrylic, pastel, watercolor, graphite, wood, stone, clay, wire mesh and quilting. Even steel has a place with Patrick Daniel Sarsfield’s unsettling portrait of his wife as a 115-foot abstract cubist sculpture.

The exhibit counters the current preoccupation with portraiture as photographic replica — a picture, for example, shot on a cellphone in five seconds and instantly downloaded to social networking sites.

No, said Duane Preble, one of the show’s three jurors, "Art is not replica. It’s about the response of the artist to the attitude, energy and appearance of the person being portrayed. It’s a very challenging part of the art world. You have to have a lot of skill with visual form to put down what you see, what you feel."

The show’s other jurors were Sally French and Michael Takemoto.

One of the most popular pieces in the show is Hawaii island artist Ken Charon’s portrait of Saramae Landers at 105, a delightful lady who leaps out of the acrylic on hemp, eyes shining.

"It captured her essence, her sparkle," said French. "I felt it uplifting, inspiring."

Another showstopper is the carved lava pohaku by Hoaka Delos Reyes, a former wall builder from Maui who learned Hawaiian carving using traditional tools. Native Hawaiians at the opening broke into chant to honor the piece, "Ka ‘Ulu," which honors Kyle Nakanelua, captain of the crash rescue department at Kahului Airport, where the artist works.

A noble face breaks out of the raw stone with power and grace, symbolizing the essence of what it is to be a Hawaiian kane, a male both strong and nurturing, says Delos Reyes, like the breadfruit carved on the side of the stone that gives its name to the work.

Another powerful work is Stephen Garnin’s painting of "Parez Punaluu Kahikina, Kalaupapa Native Son," whose parents, diagnosed with Hansen’s disease, were taken to the settlement on Molokai, leaving their son to be raised with relatives "topside."

Kahikina, clad in green T-shirt, camouflage pants and heavy shades, kneels beside the cross marking the grave of his father. He holds a cigarette and a can of beer. His right hand and foot show something of the distortion of the disease. The scene is lonely, but the foreground merges skillfully into the light on the fields behind, somehow redemptive. A sad irony is that Kahikina perished in an accident a few days after the portrait was begun.

The $15,000 Jurors’ Choice Award went to young Maui artist Jonathan Yukio Clark for the tour de force "Grandmother’s Story," a mixed-media work depicting the life journey of Catherine Yamada, who was born in Japan and came to Hawaii for an education.

Her visage, sturdy like a tree, is painted in a hyperrealistic style on a board of native woods glued together and inlaid with gold. Two Japanese obi of the artist’s design hang on either side of his grandmother. One depicts her homeland and her family’s crest, or "mon." The other is painted with images of Manoa Valley where she resides, and the Yamada crest.

It’s an extraordinary effort by a rising star who creates layers of sophistication, says French.

Elsewhere, we see artist Kirk Kurokawa sitting on a couch gazing fondly at his wife, who is smiling at her new baby while the family dogs look on. We see Vince Hazen’s depiction of a small child, a puzzle created of tape and Robert Lober’s compellingly honest self-portrait. We even meet Karen Stoll, Penny Nichol’s clear-eyed Lihue psychotherapist.

For Preble the tone of the show is captured perfectly by Robert Weiss’ scrimshaw on mammoth ivory of his in-laws, 100th Battalion veteran Mitsuo Hamasu and his wife of 63 years, Tsuruye.

Their visages of quiet dignity shine from the warm medium, the artist’s love for them immortalized in a piece that will last for centuries.

"That underscores the overriding feeling of this show," Preble said. "There’s so much compassion and empathy, so much humanity. You’re not going to spend the time and energy unless you really care. That kind of work is way too rare."