Davies Forum Exhibition and Lecture, 4/24/12

Exhibition & Public Lecture
The Davies Forum
University of San Francisco
2130 Fulton @ Parker, 94117

Exhibition
Illusions of Harmony: Forgetting the Unnamable in Japanese and American History
Kalmanovitz Hall Atrium
Tuesday, April 24 to Tuesday, May 1

Lecture
Beyond Obsequious: Honor, Abjection, and Agency in Japanese American Visual Culture
Tuesday, April 24, 6:00pm
Maier Room in Fromm Hall
Reception to Follow in Kalmanovitz Hall (probably around 7:00-8:30pm)

This is the culminating event of a semester-long forum on “Citizenship in Japan and the US.”

How can art intervene in culturalist discourse to create space for a more diversely inclusive and activated notion of citizenship? This artist talk will pick up on ideas posed by preceding Davies Forum speakers—mechanisms for remembering and forgetting critical lessons of history (Lisa Yoneyama); and the dynamics of “polite racism” and notions of national belonging (Takashi Fujitani)—to discuss the artwork in the Davies exhibition and the influences that inspired it.  Tsuchitani will share his own inquiry into issues of race and identity as they have played out in the arena of Japanese American visual representation during the course of his lifetime, along with the aesthetic strategies that he has employed to leverage this awareness into effective forms of cultural resistance, agency, and interventional change.

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More info:  The Davies Forum

Campus Map

“Four Decades of Art Activism” panel FRI 1/27

“Four Decades of Art Activism“

How can art be a catalyst for social change? Join Bay Area artists in a fishbowl conversation on Friday, January 27, 7-9 p.m., Intersection for the Arts, 925 Mission, San Francisco. Free and open to the public.

“Chain Letter” at Shoshana Wayne Gallery

One of many happy artists in line to install their art for Chain Letter

Last weekend I participated in a “Chain Letter” show down in Santa Monica, along with about 1,600 [!] other artists.  While I was down there I had a chance to visit galleries in Culver City as well as a couple museum shows (street art at MOCA Geffen and the awe inspiring Marco Brambilla at Santa Monica Museum).  LA Weekly did a fun review of the Chain Letter show (calling it “Artmaggeddon”), and I’ve posted lots of pictures of the shows and video here.

Update:  More Reviews of Chain Letter!

LA Times

Huffington Post

Art21 Blog

KCRW

In Print

 

New Book

Just published this week, The Routledge Companion to Museum Ethics: Redefining Ethics for the Twenty-First Century Museum, edited by Janet Marstine, details my “Asians Art Museum” (Lord It’s the Samurai) project, in a chapter on “Museum Censorship” by Christopher Steiner.

From the publisher, about the book:

It argues for a museum ethics discourse defined by social responsibility, radical transparency and shared guardianship of heritage. And it demonstrates the moral agency of museums: the concept that museum ethics is more than the personal and professional ethics of individuals and concerns the capacity of institutions to generate self-reflective and activist practice.”

As for my work, Steiner asserts, ‘ . . .the intervention was a productive contribution that enhanced the exhibition narrative’.

More at the Asians Art Museum blog.

In Japan

Earlier this year I was interviewed by Megumi Kitahara, professor of Japanese Studies at the Graduate School of Osaka University, for the 63rd installment of her ongoing serial essay on “Art Activism” in インパクション (Impaction) magazine.  At 14 pages in length, it’s by far the most in-depth interview I’ve ever given.

北原恵.  アート・アクティヴィズム(63), Impaction [178], 106-119, 2011.

For those who read Japanese, here’s a link to Prof. Kitahara’s academic publications on CiNii.

This is actually the second interview I’ve had published in Japan.  The first was by Yumiko Murakami for her book アジア系アメリカ人  中公新書 : アメリカの新しい顔  (Ajiakei Amerikajin: Amerika no atarashii kao) (Asian Americans: New Faces of America), reportedly the first book published in Japan on the subject of Asian Americans (Tokyo: Chūō Kōronsha, pp. 211-214, 1997).  She interviewed me about my experience producing the documentary Meeting at Tule Lake for the Tule Lake Pilgrimage.

Teaching Geisha

Like my samurai project above, my Sansei Geisha project has also influenced academic discourse.  I only recently came across the following, from May of last year:

Jan Bardsley. Teaching Geisha in History, Fiction, and Fantasy (PDF), ASIANetwork Exchange, Vol. 17, No. 2 (Spring 2010 Issue)

Jan Bardsley is a professor of Japanese Humanities at University of North Carolina, interested in feminism and popular culture in Japan, who has written about my work previously:

Liza Dalby’s Geisha: the view twenty-five years later, Southeast Review of Asian Studies, Vol. 31 (Annual 2009), pp.309-323.

Bay Area Artists for Japan

I was supposed to be in Japan right now, giving a talk today at a university in Kyoto.  Then disaster struck and everything changed.

As the crisis continues to unfold, the one thing that is clear among all the uncertainty is that Japan is facing a long and difficult recovery.

Please join me and others in the art community as we use our art to help those who are suffering, in an art benefit for the relief effort in Japan.  We need your help!

Creative Process: mock record label

I had been wanting to come up with a visual way to connect the thematic content of my Perpetual FOREIGNER t-shirt with the current wave of xenophobia that’s manifesting across the country as legislation in states like Arizona (legalizing racial profiling) and Oklahoma (banning Muslim religious law).

Inspiration for this project came to me in the form of song titles: “By the Time I get to Phoenix (I’ll be profiled)“, and “I Fought (Sharia) Law, but the Law won,” based on familiar tunes, a couple cover versions playable here: (click to listen)

“And now it’s dark . . .” New Etching

New Print!

" • • • • ", intaglio etching (soft-ground drawing + aquatint), 6 x6 in.

On view this weekend and next:
Fort Mason Printmakers Holiday Print Sale
Opening: Fri. Dec 3, 6-9pm
Sat & Sun Dec 4 & 5, 11am-5pm
Ft. Mason Art Center, Bldg. B, Rm 101
Laguna & Marina Blvd, SF 94123

Holiday Studio Sale – 1890 Bryant St. Studios, #311
Sat Dec 11, noon to 6pm
1890 Bryant St @ Mariposa
Studio 311, SF 94110

Inspired Packaging for Shadowshop @ sfmoma

Playing on the '70s rock band theme: LP-style packaging

T-shirts folded around actual LP covers

Root Division Auction Preview

Opening Reception: Saturday, October 9, 2010, 7pm-10pm
Sliding Scale Suggested Donation: $2-20

Exhibition Dates: October 6th – 21th
Gallery Hours: Wednesdays through Saturdays, 2pm – 6pm (or by appointment)

“Root Division presents a chance to see what all the Auction fuss is about. Come see the art we’ll be auctioning off at the event on October 21st, including work by over 135 established and emerging local artists. The Opening Reception is free to attend and almost as fun as the ticketed event. In case you’d rather not have to bid against your best friend for your favorite piece of art, everything will be available for purchase during the Opening at 110% of the retail price.”

Tickets for the Auction on October 21, 2010 can be purchased via website here, phone, or in person.

For a list of participating artists and more, visit www.rootdivision.org

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And elsewhere, 

Ongoing Exhibition:

Figuratively
USF Law School’s Rotunda Gallery
2130 Fulton Street (@ Parker), 94117

From August 13 into December
Mon-Fri, 9am∼5pm

Upcoming at SFMOMA:

Stephanie Syjuco’s Shadowshop

Borders show at Root Division

Root Division, 3175 17th St (at S. Van Ness), 94110

23 artists from 9 states . . .  just a small sampling below . . .

July 7 – 27, 2010

"Pilgrims" by Crisanta de Guzman (click for more)