The photograph shows
Eddie and Kiyolto
Hirasuna, author
Delphine’s parents, with
her older siblings Patsy
and Lester. They were
interned at Jerome, ar.
Left: Iwa Miuramade
this pin of shells dug
from the ground. Below
left: This gift for a little
girl was carved from a
red toothbrush handle.
You’ve said that you think part of this phenomenon
has been the timing.
If I had tried to do this 30 years ago, I think the em o-
tions w ould have been too raw. People didn’t w ant to
talk about the subject. But I think time has helped.
A lso, for the most part, it isn’t the artists w ho are giving
or lending these things to me, it’s their children or their
grandchildren. T h e y see this as a w ay o f honoring their
parents, and having them recognized as individuals.
What do you hope people will take away from the
book, and from the exhibit at the Renwick?
It sounds like a cliché, but I see it as a celebration o f
the human spirit. I hope people leave feeling uplifted,
feeling admiration for w hat people created.
T h e other thing is that the camps aren’t w ell-known
in the United States, even today. M any people w ill say
they know there w ere camps, or that some people w ere
put into camp, but it was ethnic cleansing o f the W est
Coast. T h ey took everybody, no exceptions. T h ey took
kids out o f orphanages and people out o f hospitals.
I think if you said, “I’m going to do an exhibition on
the internm ent cam ps,” a lot o f people w ouldn’t want
to go. It’s an uncom fortable subject. But if people go in
looking at the art, I hope they go away thinking about
the circumstances in w hich the objects w ere made and
w ho made them, thinking about w here the human spirit
lies and w ho these people w ere.
It’s like you write in the book: that you want to honor
and preserve this aspect of the Japanese-American
concentration camp experience. I think part of what’s
so effective is that these are craft objects. You see that
these are things made by hand—people’s hands—and
it brings them alive.
054 American craft dec/jan II
