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The Art of Living: Japanese American Creative Experience at Rohwer (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 3-5, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Art, History
Expression through art, Displacement
Available

Exhibition of art objects created by Japanese Americans in Rohwer . Mounted in 2011 by the Butler Center for Arkansas Studies, the exhibition was based on the collection of Mabel Rose Jamison Vogel, an art teacher at Rohwer. Vogel bequeathed the objects to McGehee, Arkansas, Mayor Rosalie Santine Gould, who in turn donated the collection to the Butler Center in 2010. The Art of Living included about 125 pieces, ranging from fashion sketches to bird pins to paintings in a wide variety of styles, augmented by photographs of the camp and interview segments with former Rohwer inmates. The project also includes an online version of the exhibition. Among the public programs tied to the exhibition's run were talks by Delphine Hirasuna, author of The Art of Gaman and by Vivienne Schiffer, daughter of Gould and author of the novel Camp Nine , which is set in a Rohwer-like concentration camp.

Chicago Goes to War, 1941-1945 (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 3-5, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Importance of community
No availability

1992–93 exhibition at the Chicago Historical Society on the impact of World War II on Chicago. Among the topics covered in the exhibition is the resettlement in the Chicago area of Japanese Americans from wartime concentration camps. It was one of several major local exhibitions that appeared around the 50th anniversary of World War II and that included aspects of the local Japanese American story.

Uprooted: Japanese American Farm Labor Camps during World War II (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Displacement, Necessity of work
Available

Traveling photographic exhibition on Japanese Americans who left the concentration camps on short term leave to work as farm laborers in the summers of 1942 and 1943. The exhibition features forty-five photographs by Farm Security Administration photographer Russell Lee , who photographed farm labor camps that housed the Japanese Americans, including one in Nyssa , Oregon. The exhibition also includes a short video that include interviews with several Japanese Americans who worked as farm laborers.

The View from Within: Japanese American Art from the Internment Camps, 1942-1945 (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 3-5, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Art, History
Expression through art, Displacement, Injustice
Limited availability

The first-ever national exhibition of more than 130 paintings and other works of art produced by Japanese American artists during their incarceration in the World War II American concentration camps, timed to commemorate the 50-year anniversary of the signing of Executive Order 9066 , which authorized the mass incarceration of over 120,000 Japanese Americans. The exhibition was curated by Karin Higa and jointly coordinated by the Japanese American National Museum , the UCLA Wight Art Gallery, and the UCLA Asian American Studies Center. It first opened at the Wight Art Gallery in Los Angeles on October 13, 1992, and ran until December 6, 1992, then subsequently traveled to the San Jose Museum of Art (January 15-April 10, 1994), Salt Lake Art Center (July 1994), Honolulu Academy of Arts (September 1994), and the Queens Museum New York (May 11-July 16, 1995).

Coming Home: Memories of Japanese American Resettlement (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Displacement, Evils of racism
No availability

Exhibition organized by the Japanese American National Museum and curated by Darcie Iki and Jim Gatewood that explored the obstacles—such as housing and employment shortages and discrimination—that Japanese Americans faced after they left the confines of America's concentration camps. The exhibit opened on August 14, 1998, and ran until February 7, 1999. The exhibit explored the process of rebuilding community as well as the individual struggle to come to terms with the larger "camp" experience.

Canefields and Deserts: Japanese American Internment (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Evils of racism, Injustice
No availability

Early traveling exhibition assembled by the Japanese American National Museum (JANM) and displayed in venues in Honolulu and Denver, Colorado, in 1992. As part of the 50th anniversary commemoration of Executive Order 9066 , JANM put together Canefields and Deserts , which opened at the Ala Moana Center in Honolulu on July 10, 1992. Curated by Pam Funai, the exhibition included photographs of Hawai'i internment camps Sand Island and Honouliuli , letter and sketches by artist George Hoshida , and a large scale model of Manzanar made by Robert Hasuike. After its brief ten-day run in Honolulu, the exhibition traveled to Denver in August 1992.

Confined Citizens: The Amache-Granada Relocation Center, 1942-1945 (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Displacement, Injustice
Available

Section within the Colorado Stories exhibition, a permanent installation at the History Colorado Center in Denver that was part of its 2012 grand opening.

Instructions to All Persons: Reflections on Executive Order 9066 (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 3-5, Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Evils of racism, Injustice, Power of the past, Rebirth, Wisdom of experience
No availability

Exhibition mounted by the Japanese American National Museum (JANM) to commemorate the 75th anniversary of Executive Order 9066 .

Living in Color: The Art of Hideo Date (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 3-5, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Art, History
Expression through art, Injustice, Immigrant experience
Available

Retrospective exhibition featuring the work of Issei painter Hideo Date at the Japanese American National Museum (JANM) that opened in 2001. Curated by Karin Higa, Living in Color draws on works Date donated to JANM as well as works held by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and Smithsonian American Art Museum from the 1930s to the 1980s. An established artist by the 1930s, Date was sent to Santa Anita and Heart Mountain during the war, where he taught art and formed an Art Students League at the latter. Best known for his watercolor and gouache painting before the war, he turned to pencil drawings while incarcerated due in part to the difficulty of obtaining painting materials while in camp. The exhibition includes several of these drawings. Unlike artists such as Henry Sugimoto or Estelle Ishigo , Date's wartime drawings do not depict scenes from the concentration camps, most …

Months of Waiting, 1942-1945 (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 3-5, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Adult
Art, History
Expression through Art, Displacement, Injustice
No availability

The first group exhibition of art created in the wartime concentration camps. Produced by the California Historical Society in 1972 as a companion to its Executive Order 9066 photographic exhibition, Months of Waiting toured several venues from 1972 to 1974.

Relocations and Revisions: The Japanese-American Internment Reconsidered (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Art, History
Expression through art, Displacement, Injustice, Evils of Racism
Limited availability

Exhibition at the Long Beach Museum of Art featuring work inspired by the wartime expulsion and incarceration by contemporary Japanese American artists, most of whom were too young to experience the concentration camps firsthand. Opening on May 10, 1992, Relocations and Revisions also included a program of videos and well as a catalog with both print and video components.

Dark Clouds Over Paradise: The Hawai'i Internees Story (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Lost honor, War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy, Rights - individual or societal
No availability

Exhibition organized by the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai'i (JCCH) that focused on the World War II internment of Japanese Americans living in Hawai'i. Originally organized in 2004, a later traveling version of the exhibition debuted in 2006 and traveled widely in Hawai'i over the next several years.

Only What We Could Carry: The Santa Anita Assembly Center (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 3-5, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Adult
History
Displacement, Injustice
Limited availability

Temporary exhibition at the Ruth and Charles Gilb Arcadia Historical Museum about the nearby detention facility. Drawing on photographs, objects, and issues of the Santa Anita Pacemaker in the museum's collection, Only What We Could Carry opened in November 2009. The museum also includes the story of the Santa Anita Assembly Center as part of its permanent gallery on the history of Arcadia.

Dear Miss Breed: Letters from Camp (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 3-5, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Importance of community, Power of words
Available

Exhibition at the Japanese American National Museum (JANM) based on the letters sent to librarian Clara Breed by Japanese American students forcibly removed to concentration camps. Dear Miss Breed opened in JANM's Legacy Center gallery on January 14, 1997, and closed on April 13, 1997. A short film of the same name was also featured in the exhibition. Though it did not travel subsequently, an online version of the exhibition was created and is available at the JANM website.

Crafting History: Arts and Crafts from America's Concentration Camps (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Art, History
Expression through art, Desire to escape
Limited availability

2002 exhibition at the Japanese American National Museum (JANM). Crafting History highlighted some 400 objects from JANM's collection made by Japanese Americans held in American concentration camps during World War II, ranging from a five foot tall Buddhist altar carved in Heart Mountain to bird pins, clothing and other textiles, and furniture. Curated by Kristine Kim, the exhibition opened on November 16, 2002. A full slate of public programs took place during the six-month run of the exhibition, including many crafting workshops. Craft items from the camps were also the subject of The Art of Gaman , a lavishly illustrated book published in 2005 and an exhibition that traveled around the country and in Japan starting in 2010.

Evacuation 1942-1945: A Japanese American Perspective (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Injustice, Evils of racism
No availability

Exhibition at the University of Washington's Suzzallo Library in 1979. Curated by Karyl Winn, the curator of manuscripts at the library, the exhibition provided an overview of the forced removal and incarceration using letters, photographs, newspaper articles and other period publications from the holdings of the library. Though the title focuses on the Japanese American perspective, the exhibition also includes perspectives of non-Japanese Americans about the events of the time.

Manzanar: Photographs by Ansel Adams of Loyal Japanese-American Relocation Center (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 3-5, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Art
Displacement, Injustice, Character - destruction, building up
Available

Landmark exhibition of Ansel Adams ' photographs of Manzanar at New York's Museum of Modern Art. Opening on November 9, 1944, Manzanar was not only the sole major museum exhibition documenting the Japanese American incarceration to be displayed while incarceration was still ongoing, but arguably the only such exhibition to appear for the next twenty-five years.

Against Their Will: The Japanese American Experience in World War II Arkansas (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Evils of racism, Injustice
Available

Exhibition centering on the experiences of Japanese Americans in Jerome and Rohwer , the two concentration camps located in Arkansas, as well as those of who lived near the camps and/or worked in them. The exhibition was developed by the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Public History Program and debuted as part of the Life Interrupted project in 2004. The largest of eight exhibitions mounted in various venues in the Little Rock area, Against Their Will debuted at Arkansas Statehouse Convention Center downstairs foyer on September 24, 2004, running through November 28, 2004. Against Their Will is currently on permanent display at the World War II Japanese American Internment Museum , which opened in McGehee, Arkansas, in 2013.

A Circle of Freedom: Lost and Restored (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Evils of racism, Importance of community
Limited availability

Exhibition at the History Museum of Hood River County on the Japanese American experience in Hood River, Oregon. Instigated by Museum Coordinator Connie Nice once she learned of the of the wartime incarceration of local Japanese Americans and the particularly virulent opposition to their postwar return, the exhibition has the support of the local community. The small exhibition included four sections: "Our Lives Before," "Our Lives Removed," " Our Lives in Camp," and "Our Lives in Service." Included in the exhibition are documents from the local American Legion chapter, which made national headlines in 1944 when it removed the names of Nisei soldiers from a local "roll of honor." The exhibition subsequently became a semi-permanent part of the museum.

American Heroes: Japanese American World War II Nisei Soldiers and the Congressional Gold Medal (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Patriotism - positive side or complications, Heroism - real and perceived
Limited availability

Traveling exhibition developed by the Smithsonian Institution to commemorate the awarding of the Congressional Gold Medal to the 100th Infantry Battalion , 442nd Regimental Combat Team , and Military Intelligence Service in 2011. Created by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service in partnership with National Veterans Network, National Museum of American History, and Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center, the exhibition included photo and text panels about the Japanese Americans who served in World War II along with the medal itself.

A More Perfect Union: Japanese Americans and the U.S. Constitution (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Will to survive, Patriotism - positive side or complications, Nationalism - complications, Immigrant experience, Evils of racism
Widely available

In 1987, the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History (NMAH) opened A More Perfect Union: Japanese Americans and the US Constitution (MPU), an exhibition on the World War II Japanese American detention centers designed to coincide with the anniversary of the signing of the Constitution. Though the creation of an exhibition that exemplified a moment of weakness for the Constitution was opposed by some, the exhibition stayed long past its intended term and was replaced with a permanent online version even after its physical removal in 2004.

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