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Indepth Arts News:
"Roger Shimomura: An American Diary and Shaping Stories – Two Exhibitions"
2001-12-26 until 2002-03-24
Bellevue Art Museum
Bellevue, WA,
USA United States of America
Two series of paintings by artist Roger Shimomura, An American Diary and Memories of Childhood, will open on December 8, 2001, in the Second Floor Gallery and runs through March 24, 2002. Also opening on December 8 will be Shaping Stories in the West Gallery, which will run through March 10, 2002. These two complementary exhibitions and related programming investigate how artists, through narrative and storytelling, transform experiences, histories, anecdotes and memories into a wide variety of contemporary art forms.
With 30 paintings and ten lithographs, Roger Shimomura tells the story of his family’s (and his own) internment during World War II from different perspectives in An American Diary and Memories of Childhood. The series is based on diaries kept by his grandmother, Toku Shimomura, while interned in Camp Minidoka, Idaho, during World War II. In these painted and printed responses, Shimomura addresses issues of racial and ethnic stereotyping. Amnesia, a multi-media performance piece created by the artist, will premier at the Museum on January 10 and 11 at 7pm and is free with admission. The performances focus on different generations’ perspectives of the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. A native of Seattle, Roger Shimomura now lives and teaches in Lawrence, Kansas. A catalog accompanies this traveling exhibit.
Shaping Stories is a survey of work by contemporary visual artists making use of traditional and emerging narrative forms. Anecdote, allegory, symbolism and the surreal are used to suggest narrative content. This exhibition will include
work in a variety of media: sculpture, painting, installation, video, photography and interactive media. The list of local, national and international artists includes Mark Bennett, Allison Moritsugu, Darlene Nguyen-Ely, Eugene Parnell, Paul Pfeiffer, Jame Reid, Phil Roache, Tamar Rosenberg, Jason Salavon, Jake Seniuk, Typing Explosion and Bill Viola. The exhibition also includes a large group of paintings used as illustrations for Harlequin Romance novels, collected by Daniel Eskenazi.
IMAGE:
Roger Shimomura
Memories of Childhood, No 3, 1999
Lithograph
Courtesy of the artist
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