Tribute
acrylic, Photos printed on vellum collaged on cradled birch board
18 x 24
I’m half-Japanese, half-white. My father’s Japanese-American family was unjustly held in the concentration camp in Minidoka, ID during WWII only because of their ancestry. Around 120,000 Japanese-Americans were rounded up on the West Coast and imprisoned. Over half of them were American citizens but were deprived of their constitutional right to habeas corpus–the right to defend themselves in court.
I created “Tribute” to honor my relative Geri Takahashi who was put into concentration camp, along with two of her brothers, a sister and her mother, at the age of 21. She was born in the USA so was an American citizen. She had never even been to Japan yet was treated as if she was a war criminal. Being unjustly incarcerated at a young age affected her self esteem and she never dated or married, she just worked 6 days a week and volunteered in her Protestant church. Like many of her generation who were in camp, she would never speak of her time there. My hope is that “Tribute” tells the story that she could not.
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