The exhibition “Fa’a Samoa: The Samoan Way, Photographs by Dr. Lowell Holmes” will be on display at Wichita State University’s Ablah Library Thursday, Oct. 20, through Friday, Dec. 2.

The exhibition and presentations are free and open to the public.

There will be an opening reception from 4-6 p.m. Oct. 20, with a talk by Ellen Holmes, beginning at 4:30 p.m. on the lower level of Ablah Library.

Refreshments will be served.

Lowell Holmes was the founder of the anthropology department and the anthropology museum at Wichita State. The Lowell D. Holmes Museum of Anthropology was later named in his honor.

Ellen Holmes is his widow and accompanied him for the fieldwork in American Samoa during the 1970s and ’80s.

Samoan life

The exhibition will display photographs illustrating many aspects of life in American Samoa, from Samoan ceremonies to everyday routines, such as meal preparation.

The photographs were taken by the late Lowell Holmes while he was doing field work in American Samoa beginning in 1954. The exhibit will also showcase original artifacts of the Samoan culture, including jewelry, a canoe and more.

The premiere showing of a new film “In Search of Tradition: A Samoan Village in 1954,” produced by Lowell Holmes, will be shown from 4-5:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 10, on the lower level of Ablah Library.

Refreshments will also be served following this event.

This exhibition is sponsored by the Holmes Museum of Anthropology, the Department of Anthropology and WSU Libraries.