#apaartists

Thank you so much to all of my family and friends (part two) @hsu7769 @hey.ngoc for coming out to my @kearnystreetworkshop #apature2019 #film showcase in #October #October2019 @roxie_theater #sanfrancisco 🙏🏼💗 meant the world to me! . . . #filmfestival #films #shortfilm #womeninfilm #representationmatters #directedbywomen #api #asianamerican #chinese #chineseamerican #artfestival #asianartist #asianart #apaartists #apa #asianpacificamerican #apaart #apacommunity (at Roxie Theater) https://www.instagram.com/p/B7F-4aRJPet/?igshid=1d3j9smzp76ez

During WWII, Miné Okubo (left) and Kay Sekimachi (right) were both forcibly removed from their homes in California and sent to Tanforan Assembly Center, then imprisoned at Topaz Relocation Center. Over 100,000 people of Japanese descent (most of whom where US citizens) were imprisoned in these camps and similar ones across this country. Sekimachi and Okubo met sometime during 1942-1944 when they were at Tanforan and Topaz. They both became artists and maintained a lifelong friendship documented through the letters they exchanged over five decades after leaving the camps. Read more about their correspondence on our blog: https://www.aaa.si.edu/blog/2016/05/epistolary-friendship-min%C3%A9-okubo%E2%80%99s-letters-to-kay-sekimachi Image Credit: Photo of Okubo by Cecil J. Thompson, circa 1980s. Photographer of Sekimachi unknown.

Isamu Noguchi was an acclaimed Japanese American sculptor. The Archives of American Art has a 1973 oral history interview with Noguchi discussing his life and career. His monumental influence on design is still apparent today, notably through his lanterns and other furniture, which are still being produced.https://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/interviews/oral-history-interview-isamu-noguchi-11906 Image Citation: Isamu Noguchi in his studio, 1968 / Russell Lynes, photographer. Russell Lynes papers, 1935-1986. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution

Miyé Matsukata (1922-1981) was a jewelry designer and silversmith in Boston, Mass. She worked in her jewelry firm Janiye in Boston from 1950 until her death. Her papers include biographical material, correspondence, subject files, exhibition files, photographs and slides, numerous sketchbooks and sketches of her jewelry designs and travels abroad, writings, sales records for jewelry orders, audio-visual material, and printed material.

Chicago artist and educator Ray Yoshida’s papers are currently being processed and prepared for digitization!  He was a painter, collagist, and professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.  Yoshida was a member and mentor of the Chicago Imagists, a group of representational artists whose work is influenced by Surrealism and sources traditionally considered outside of the art world, such as pop culture and comics.  His papers include biographical material, correspondence, writings, notebooks, teaching records, personal business records, printed material, source material, photographs, sketchbooks, artwork, and scrapbooks.

Here's a preview of the Kamekichi Tokita papers that was recently processed by one of our archivists.  Tokita was a Japanese American painter based in Seattle, Washington.  His work was supported by the Seattle Art Museum and exhibited regularly in Seattle and California between 1929 and 1936. He was interned with his family at Minidoka, Idaho, during World War II.

Just a glimpse at the accompanying image of works by Korean American artist Nam June Paik (1932-2006), and you can see why he is widely known as the creator of video art! He was a prolific artist who created sculptures and installations which often incorporated television sets and videotapes. The images of his work are all from assorted snapshots from the Dorothy Goldeen Gallery records, circa 1990-circa 1995.

During WWII, Tanforan Racetrack in San Bruno, CA was renamed “Tanforan Assembly Center” and used as a Japanese American temporary detention facility where horse stalls were converted into barracks, often with entire families crowded a single “apartment.” Fiber artist Kay Sekimachi was roughly 15 y.o. when she and her family were forcibly removed to Tanforan in 1942. Here is a small sampling of Sekimachi’s drawings depicting Tanforan and the horse stalls.