What an amazing exhibition. Curator Kenji Stoll spans the era from original ukiyo-e ( floating world) prints to our very present day in anime inspired works. In his choice of contemporary artists he spans the distance from highly visible professional artists like Roger Shimomura and self taught artists like VanVan.
Kenji Stoll is a tattoo artist! If you look at his creations these are not ordinary tattoos, but elaborate creations based on Japanese style and mythic figures. So it is not surprising that his works in the exhibition are also giving us a warrior of two well known gods of wind and thunder storms. But his huge mural sized work called “Nikkei Butterfly” features many patterns and a Samurai warrior. “Nikkei” is a term for all the generations of people of Japanese descent who live outside of Japan. And the butterfly signifies transformation and rebirth, so this brilliantly colored mural sized painting celebrates Japanese culture.
A large work by the pioneering artist Roger Shimomura is titled “Minidoka No.5 (442)”, a reference to the 442nd Japanese American regiment in World War II. Behind the large samurai warrior are 42 faces in Japanese fighting garb, clearly referring to the soldiers in the battalion. Shimomura has been speaking about the detention camps throughout his career. He started with Ukiyo-e style images many years ago but soon allowed pop art color and figures to highlight his compositions. This large painting (in the collection of the Tacoma Art Museum!) forms a perfect partner to where Stoll is going in this exhibition: the continuity of Japanese ukiyo-e and contemporary Japanese American art.
Ed Augai has only white lines on a strange colored deep rose to give us the large head of Shoki the Demon Queller. Shoki truly looms over us, although he is a monster who kills demons, he is pretty frightening .
In contrast VanVan brings us small manga style drawings with characters such as Uranus and Neptune. Her delightful small drawings of lively figures with big eyes and messy colored blue or blond hair capture the spirit of those characters. I can attest to that since we had an anime conference in Seattle last weekend and there was a lot of flowing blue and blonde hair on men and women!
Lauren Iida’s ability with cut out designs has impressed me for many years. “Nightmare” features a large cut out of a cabin interior in a detention camps. Inside are two figures, one is looking at a monster breaking through the window, the other sits passively at a table. Behind him is a cut out screen that hides a sun rising over a mountain. The distance from the sense of isolation and entrapment in the cabin and the glowing sun and mountain is far. Much closer is the monster breaking through the window.
Also less obviously related to popular culture, Hanako O’Leary speaks of her heritage: “I am one in a long line of Japanese women who dared to defy tradition and forge their own path. . . . I make art because I believe it is through my hands that the deepest secrets, oldest stories, and most potent magic of my ancestors are preserved.” Here we see two War Masks, The Dreamer and the Matriarch, as well as Venus Jar 5: My intelligence. All three works represent strong woman. O’ Leary places a vagina as the mouth of the War Masks, asserting woman’s power.
Coming back to ukiyo-e Yoshiko Yamamoto, was born and raised in Tokyo, but spent thirty years on the West Coast. She returned to Japan and is now creating beautiful prints that affiliate with the original ukiyo-e style on woodblock but also are contemporary. She makes a smooth transition to the ukiyo-e prints clustered in one end of the gallery under subdued light to keep them from fading, Here we see actors, landscapes, birds and animals as well as hero fighters. We can see connections to works in the exhibition in subject (Shoki the Demon Queller) or style (Stoll). The subtle lines and use of gradations of color, careful observation of details make each of these works an exploration.
This exhibition has something for everyone from tiny-scaled figures to huge paintings, from the ukiyo-e to their contemporary interpretations, highly sophisticated artists to self educated.
