Essay

ArtsPiece: Time and Memory in the Work of

Roger Shimomura and Kara Walker

Time and Memory: Roger Shimomura and Kara Walker

Our current ArtsPiece brings together two artists whose work delves deeply into the issues of time and memory and who do so in ways that explore the role of memory, popular culture, and family histories in unflinching examinations that are both haunting and disturbing.

Roger Shimomura (American, b. 1939)

Roger Shimomura (http://www.rshim.com/) was born in Seattle, Washington a few years prior to the entrance of the United States into WWII after the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor by Japanese Imperial forces. The shock of the attack and the fears that ensued prompted the United States to intern many thousands of Japanese citizens in internment camps located in various locations around the country. Shimomura and his family were among those Japanese Americans who were forcibly interned. Shimomura's experience as an internee has informed much of his work throughout his career. His paintings and prints often take on "stereotypical American images of Asians" (Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Shimomura) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Shimomura) in order to confront and challenge historical and contemporary biases. Shimomura retired in 2004 from the University of Kansas (Lawrence) where he was a professor for 35 years but remains an active and vibrant artist.

In the painting series, Minidoka on My Mind (completed 2006–2012, Shimomura draws upon the years he spent at the MinidokaWar Relocation Center when he was a child. Shimomura describes this series as:

[T]he culmination of years of [his] perusing images culled from books, magazines, government publications, personal recollections, and the internet. The result of this search has been a visual distillation of tar paper barracks, barbed wire, and desolate landscapes, which are inhabited by muted occupants standing in line to eat and to clean, quietly interacting, contemplating their fate...and to wait.

The video below presents the artist speaking about this series of work when it was on exhibition at the Missoula Art Museum:

Missoula Art Museum Roger Shimomura: Minodaka on My …

In yet another series of paintings, An American Diary, the artist drew diary entries written by his grandmother between 1941–43. The series of entries present her account of her and her family's experience in the internment camps. In 2015, Shimomura presented an artist talk about this series at the Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM). During this lengthy talk (1:23), Shimomura "discusses paintings, prints, and experimental theatre pieces that span his forty-year career" (Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iUwbKfH0Bk). You can view this talk in the video below:

An American Diary: Artist Talk with Roger Shimomura

Kara Walker (American, b. 1969)

Kara Walker is an African American artist who works across many media, exploring controversial themes of race, gender, sexuality, and violence. She is best known for her appropriation of the silhouette, (http://www.artnet.com/artwork/426235335/983/kara-walker-untitled.html) which she has used in room-sized installations, sculptures, and smaller works on paper (http://www.artnet.com/artwork/426046797/424591215/kara-walker-freedom-a-fable-a-curious-interpretation- of-the-wit-of-a-negress-in-troubled-times.html) . Born in California, Walker moved to Georgia at the age of 13, when her father—artist Larry Walker (http://www.artnet.com/artists/larry-walker/) —accepted a teaching position at Georgia State University. Walker received her BFA from the Atlanta College of Art, and went on to earn a MFA at the Rhode Island School of Design in 1994.

Walker’s work illustrates and overlays racial stereotypes of the past and present; her work not only addresses slavery and racial discrimination in the Antebellum South (http://www.artnet.com/artwork/424824217/983/kara-walker-buzzards-roost-pass-harpers-pictorial-history- of-the-civil-war-annotated.html) , but also raises awareness to the intrinsic bigotry that still exists throughout the United States. At age 28, Walker became the youngest person to accept the MacArthur Foundation Scholarship, an honor that was as prestigious as it was controversial. Many African American artists have spoken out against Walker’s work, most notably Betye Saar (http://www.artnet.com/artists/betye-saar/) , who argues that Walker’s use of physiognomic stereotypes further supports such bias, rather than attack it. Even amidst controversy and criticism, Walker’s art has been exhibited at major institutions, such as the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. In 2002, Walker was appointed as the United States representative to the São Paolo Biennale in Brazil. (Source: http://www.artnet.com/artists/kara-walker/biography (http://www.artnet.com/artists/kara-walker/biography) )

In 2014, Walker created her first large-scale public art project: A Subtlety or the Marvelous Sugar Baby (http://creativetime.org/projects/karawalker/) . The project was sponsored by Creative Time (http://creativetime.org/) , a public arts organization located in New York City. The project was located on the grounds of theDomino Sugar Factory (located in Brooklyn) and paid homage to the many workers who produced sugar for the United States. The short video below presents the artist speaking about this piece.

Kara Walker: "A Subtlety, or the Marvelous Sugar Baby" | Art…

Recently, Walker was featured in the PBS program, "Finding Your Roots (http://www.pbs.org/weta/finding-your-roots/) ." In the program, Walker together with host Henry Louis Gates, Jr traces the artist's roots to South Carolina and to Georgia to explore family history and stories passed down through generations of Walker's family. You can read more about this very personal exploration at this location (http://www.culturetype.com/2016/01/10/after-tackling-americas-racial-history-

in-her-work-kara-walker-finds-her-own-roots-on-pbs/) .

Kara Walker takes on some of American society's most unsettling and controversial issues. In 2014, the artist turned her focus to gun control and the White Supremacist movement. The Camden Arts Centre provided three gallery spaces for Walker's work and described it as "work [that] weaves together historical documents of slavery with more recent racial issues. (Source: Camden Arts Centre (https://www.camdenartscentre.org/whats-on/view/walker) ). The video below presents the artist discussing this exhibit.

10:34

Kara Walker: Interview. Camden Arts Centre, London, 10 October 2013 (https://vimeo.com/77189983) from studio international (https://vimeo.com/studiointernational) on Vimeo

(https://vimeo.com) .

Kara Walker discusses her exhibition at Camden Arts Centre (https://vimeo.com/78926890) from Camden Arts Centre (https://vimeo.com/camdenartscentre) on Vimeo (https://vimeo.com) .