Each week, the Archives features a woman who has been a groundbreaker at the Smithsonian, past or present, in a series titled Wonderful Women Wednesday.
Art historian Healoha Johnston is the curator of Asian Pacific American Women’s Cultural History at the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center. She researches and shares stories about underrecognized women artists, intellectuals, and activists.
In 2015, Johnston became the first assistant curator of the arts of Hawai‘i at the Honolulu Museum of Art. Before that, she served as an assistant curator at the Hawai‘i State Foundation on Culture and the Arts and as an independent curator at the San Diego Natural History Museum. Johnston has also worked as a grant writer for the Hula Preservation Society and as a policy specialist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
She earned a bachelor’s and two master’s degrees from the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa.
Related Resources
- “Curator Healoha Johnston Connects Asian Pacific American History to our Present,” Because of Her Story, Smithsonian American Women’s History Initiative
- Healoha Johnston, Curator of Asian Pacific American Women’s Cultural History, Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center
- “Museum welcomes first curator devoted to arts of Hawai’i collection,” by Lesa Griffith, Honolulu Museum of Art