Jim and Nancy Killet, who never meant to be art dealers now run Hawaii's largest art gallery and most well known galleries in America

Born 250 miles apart, in small towns in Tennessee and Arkansas, Jim and Nancy Killett met in college and married right after graduation. With their dual physical education degrees—Jim coached football, Nancy gymnastics—they traveled to New Mexico, Florida, and Okinawa. . . .

That doesn’t exactly sound like the biography of a couple running one of the most swank, successful galleries in America. But nothing about the Killetts fits the art-gallery picture, from their lean, rawboned middle-American strength, to their relaxed confidence and good humor, to the way they casually point me to the glossy art pamphlets that other art dealers might shove in my face. And what’s most surprising is that in a business sometimes derided as crass and hype-driven, Jim and Nancy Killett bring a true family feeling to their dealings with their artists, customers, staff, and the kids in their community. 

The Killetts never dreamed of becoming art impresarios. Except for the years 1968 to 1972, when Jim served as a Marine aviator, they appeared to be on a conservative educational track whose principal goal was a decent chunk of retirement savings. 

A bemused smile flits across Jim’s face when he recalls how he decided to trade that conservative life style for a series of wildly impulsive decisions. While teaching in damp, drizzly Germany, he watched Hawaii Five-O once a week. The show brought Hawai‘i into his home in living color. “We decided to move to Maui.”

It took some nerve. The Killetts quit their jobs, sold their possessions, took out their retirement money, and said goodbye to friends and family. A couple of months later they wound up on the doorstep of a real-estate office in Lahaina, ready to plunk down their life savings for just about any business they could buy.

It was an older, more laid-back Lahaina, a time when dogs could sleep undisturbed in the middle of the street. Whatever pause that gave Jim, the beauty of the seaside hamlet soon put his doubts to rest. When the ice cream parlor he wanted to buy proved unavailable, Jim bought into the 1,500-square-foot business next door to the real-estate office—an art gallery selling $400 paintings and puka shell necklaces. He paid $35,000 for the business, and took a 14-year lease on the building with a rent of $750 per month. “Our relatives in Arkansas didn’t even know what an art gallery was. They thought we were crazy.”

Novices in the fledgling Maui arts scene, the Killetts focused on accomplished local artists in slowly raising their Lahaina Galleries above the gift shop/art-gallery level. But in the beginning, there were lots of small items and small sales. “I did a good job boxing and wrapping,” Nancy smiles. But in Jim’s view, “Sometimes [customers would] buy something just because Nancy was so nice.”  

The Killetts’ break came with a then-unknown painter of seascapes, Robert Lyn Nelson. Jim Killett departs from his usual modesty to take credit for suggesting that Nelson paint New England whaling scenes because of Lahaina’s whaling background. “Then one day [Nelson] comes in with a portrait of a whale underwater. Next thing you know it sold, and next thing you know, his paintings are selling like crazy. Then [Nelson] came up with the brilliant idea of doing ‘two worlds’: above and below the water, and suddenly we’ve gone from being a $70,000-a-year, mom-and-pop operation to a $4 million-a-year business.”

That’s a bit of an exaggeration; it wasn’t that quick and it wasn’t just Nelson. The Killetts cultivated a roster of technically dazzling, accomplished artists, including Guy Buffet, whose slyly irresistible portraits of waiters, chefs and sommeliers have made him the official artist for Perrier Jouet champagne; Dario Campanile, who applies the luminous technique of a Salvador Dali to his own particular dreamscapes; and the late sculptor Frederick Hart, creator of the Vietnam Memorial’s three G.I.’s, the “Creation” panels of the National Cathedral, and the incredible pioneering acrylic sculptures still on display at Lahaina Galleries. Ironically, Jim Killett even wound up doing business with Hawaii Five-O’s leading man, Jack Lord, who both painted and made prints. 

The Killetts have had their ups and downs, but over the years, with steadfast industry, they’ve kept thriving and expanding: to Kapalua, Wailea, San Francisco, Fashion Island in Newport Beach, and most recently, Bend, Oregon. A lot of their success derives from their loyalty to their artists and to their sales staff, whom they assiduously train and support. “We’re here to help them, and we don’t set them [competitively] against each other,” Nancy told me. 

The Killetts work closely with artists and staff on special events that can get fairly adventurous. “We take small groups of collectors to Mr. Hart’s studio and on a tour of the memorial and National Cathedral every year.” At an event held at the Meridien Hotel in Newport featuring wildlife artist Gary Swanson, they brought in a baby elephant, an eagle and a lion. When I congratulate Jim on his showmanship, he cheerfully replies, “Sometimes it works!”

The Killetts offer these experiences not just for the sales value. Like good teachers, they want their customers to learn from the artists and grow truly passionate about their art. “When you figure somebody’s picked out a piece of art that they’re gonna live with for the rest of their lives, it’s pretty gratifying. Ours is an emotional sale, and we don’t want them to buy it if they’re not going to get emotional about it.

“We try to have fun in our business, too,” says Jim, who enjoys committing practical jokes. When an invitation to the opening of David Paul’s Lahaina Grill instructed him to come “dressed to kill,” Jim arrived in khakis, boots and camouflage hat, complete with a duck call. 

Lahaina Galleries has remained a mom-and-pop business in the best sense of the word: the Killetts run it like one big ‘ohana (family). Their company is 30 percent employee owned; and Jim and Nancy radiate parental pride over the fact that their son, Lee, set up one of the first Maui gallery websites for them while that software was still in its infancy.

The Killetts have worked hard to spread that ‘ohana feeling to the larger Maui community. Nancy, who grew up in a poor, working-class family, has given countless hours over the last 25 years as a youth leader and Sunday school teacher at the Lahaina Baptist Church. The Killetts frequently open their home—and their pool—to this group, sometimes entertaining as many as 30 kids at a time.

Jim has helped his wife in all her activities, and regularly donates art to isle fund raisers. As a member of the West Maui Taxpayers Association, he helped raise money for the privately funded fire station at Napili. And he was a founding member of the Lahaina Town Action Committee, instrumental in establishing Lahaina’s classy, sassy and profitable Friday Art Night (though, characteristically, he gives Joan McKelvey of South Seas Trading Company, one of the oldest stores in Lahaina, primary credit for creating that event).

The sign on the door may say “gallery,” but as far as the Killetts are concerned, “We are definitely in the people business.” 

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