the art of gaman: arts and crafts from the japanese internment camps, 1942-1946

http://americanart.si.edu/exhibitions/archive/2010/gaman/

This is a really interesting NPR story on The Art of Gaman, a showcase of arts and crafts made by Japanese Americans in U.S. internment camps during World War II, now on display at Smithsonian's Renwick Gallery in Washington D.C.: The Creative Art Of Coping In Japanese Internment.

The exhibit is curated by Delphine Hirasuna, a third-generation Japanese American who was inspired when she stumbled upon her family's old internment-era camp-made trinkets:
Delphine Hirasuna, a third-generation Japanese-American, was organizing family belongings after her mother's death and found a bird pin that belonged to her mother, stashed away in an old wooden box in the garage. Lacquered, with shades of brown and yellow - it was this pin that inspired the exhibit at the Renwick.

Hirasuna found many other trinkets from her family's time in internment, and began asking around for other camp-made objects. She began going house to house in California farm country.

"When I asked them if they had anything, they would go into their sheds ... and they would haul out this dusty box," Hirasuna says. "And the items in the box would still be wrapped in newspaper from 1945. So it was pretty obvious to me that they never looked at it when they brought it back from camp."
The exhibit ranges from paintings, to photographs, to carvings and furntiure -- all items fashioned behind barb wire, during one of America's darkest moments. For more information about the exhibit, which runs through January 30, visit the Smithsonian Art Museum website here.
The Art of Gaman showcases arts and crafts made by Japanese Americans in U.S. internment camps during World War II. Soon after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in December 1941, all ethnic Japanese on the West Coast—more than two-thirds of whom were American citizens by birth—were ordered to leave their homes and move to ten inland internment camps for the duration of the war. While in these bleak camps, the internees used scraps and found materials to make furniture and other objects to beautify their surroundings. Arts and crafts became essential for simple creature comforts and emotional survival. These objects—tools, teapots, furniture, toys and games, musical instruments, pendants and pins, purses and ornamental displays—are physical manifestations of the art of gaman, a Japanese word that means to bear the seemingly unbearable with dignity and patience.

The exhibition features more than 120 objects, most of which are on loan from former internees or their families. The display at the Renwick Gallery includes several objects that have not been seen publicly, including works by Ruth Asawa, Jimmy Tsutomu Mirikitani, Isamu Noguchi, Henry Sugimoto, and master woodworkers Gentaro and Shinzaburo Nishiura. It presents historical context through archival photographs, artifacts, and documentary films. The exhibition is organized by San Francisco-based author and guest curator Delphine Hirasuna, and is based on her 2005 book The Art of Gaman, published by Ten Speed Press.

The exhibition is presented under the honorary patronage of The Honorable Norman Y. Mineta. Mr. Mineta, a former Congressman, Secretary of Transportation, and Regent of the Smithsonian, was interned as a child at Heart Mountain in Wyoming.



Free Public Programs
Friday, March 5, at noon, lecture by Delphine Hirasuna
Wednesday, March 10, at noon, gallery talk with Kennedy
Wednesday, March 31, at noon, lecture by Karen Matsuoka
Sunday, April 11, at 2 p.m., artist talk with Mira Nakashima and Wendy Maruyama
Saturday, May 1, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., Family Day



Read recent posts on the Museum’s blog Eye Level
February 19, 2010, Gaman: FDR and the Japanese American Internment Camps
March 5, 2010, Gaman and the Story of the Bird Pins
May 7, 2010, Gaman and the Story of the Vest with a Thousand Knots



Recent news about the exhibition
National Public Radio, Morning Edition, May 12, 2010, “The Creative Art Of Coping In Japanese Internment” by Susan Stamberg
BBC, The Strand, April 7, 2010, features “The Art of Gaman”with Delphine Hirasuna
WAMU 88.5 FM, April 4, 2010 “Renwick Gallery Displays Crafts Made By Japanese In Internment Camps” by Asma Khalid
The Washington Post, March 28, 2010, “'The Art of Gaman': Life behind walls we were too scared to live without” by Philip Kennicott
Smithsonian magazine, March 12, 2010, Around the Mall, "Gaman at the Renwick: The Art and Craft of Dignity"




Credit
The Art of Gaman: Arts and Crafts from the Japanese American Internment Camps, 1942-1946 is presented at the Renwick Gallery, with the cooperation of the Japanese American Citizens League, San Francisco Chapter. The James Renwick Alliance, Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership, Nion McEvoy, and Cary Frieze provided support for the exhibition.