Get a look at some of the state’s best in crafts at the 51st Hawai‘i Craftsmen Annual Statewide Juried Exhibition, which opens next week at the Honolulu Museum of Art school.

About 100 pieces, selected from around 300 that were submitted from around the state, will be on display, said exhibit chairman Christopher Edwards, himself a sculptor. Traditionally, about a third are from the neighbor islands, he said. Works in clay, fiber, glass, wood, metal, stone and mixed media will be presented.

“As a juried exhibition, we don’t have a theme, we just ask people to send us their best work,” Edwards said. “Anyone can submit. … They don’t have to be a Hawaii Craftsmen member.”

This year’s juror is Isabella Ellaheh Hughes, artistic director and co-founder of the Honolulu Biennial Foundation. “This year we wanted a local juror who could make connections between the Hawaii Craftsmen artists and the Biennial Foundation, and the larger world that Biennial Foundation represents,” Edwards said.

Hughes, in her juror’s statement, said she was interested in “the relationship between traditional techniques and materials, reimagined with an innovative, original aesthetic.

“Creating forward-thinking, inventive pieces, yet looking to and honoring the past (heritage, history, tradition) as a point of inspiration has always been of great fascination for me and will absolutely be something that will resonate strongly when jurying,” she wrote.

IN ADDITION to juried pieces, this year’s exhibit highlights the work of two established artists: feather lei maker Boris Huang and ceramicist Jennifer Owen of Maui.

Huang and Owen “have given a lot to artists in Hawaii and Hawai’i Craftsmen in particular,” Edwards said.

Huang is known for creating his own lei hulu patterns, using feathers from goose, pheasant, duck and other birds.

“His work is incredible,” said Edwards, who has been to Huang’s studio to watch him work. “He starts with a bag of feathers and some thread, and every single feather is hand-tied on with very specific knots and in a very specific order. It’s an extraordinarily level of craft.”

Owen, a retired University of Hawaii-Maui professor, uses ceramics to create abstract architectural structures.

“She calls them all ‘hale’ – the Hawaiian word for house – so they’re sculptural forms that are reminiscent of house forms,” Edwards said.

The exhibit also features a collection of extremely personal works by the late Fred Roster, a professor of sculpture who taught at the University of Hawaii-Manoa for 42 years.

“We’ll have a very special exhibit of work that has never been seen before. It was given from him to his wife Lynette over the years, little tokens of love,” Edwards said.

“Fred was extraordinarily creative, so they run the gamut, from little charms to a salad fork that he made that uses some of his personal symbols. … Some of it jewelry, some of it is functional items, some of it is little art artifacts.”