2023 JACL Convention and the Okaeri Exhibit
By Rob Buscher
As a lecturer in the ASAM program, the summer break is always a time for me to catch up on community projects and other work that I do outside of the university. This summer was busier than usual as I had the privilege of curating a three-day film series at the Japanese American Citizens League National Convention, while also preparing to install a new special exhibit at Shofuso Japanese House & Garden.
Since 2018 I have served as the JACL Philadelphia Chapter President, our local chapter of the oldest and largest AAPI national civil rights organization. In this capacity I am often working with the national leadership of JACL and other JACL chapters on advocacy initiatives that have allowed me to work and travel to the West coast on a semi-regular basis. Most of my relatives on the Japanese American side of my family live in California and elsewhere in the West, so it is a welcome opportunity to combine family visits with the advocacy work I do for the JACL.
This July, JACL hosted their National Convention in Los Angeles for the first time in over two decades, largely based in the Little Tokyo neighborhood of Downtown LA. Since my family lived in the Greater LA region prior to the forced removal of WWII, we have a lot of deep ties to the LA Japanese American community – which is the largest in the country at approximately 177,000 people.
In this regard, it was especially meaningful to curate the film series, which explored
themes related to the wartime incarceration, postwar resettlement, and contemporary Japanese American activist movements. I am grateful to the staff of JACL for providing a space in the convention program to host this series, and thankful to everyone at Japanese American National Museum (our venue sponsor) who made the film series possible. We could not have done this program without the support of Visual Communications who allowed us to screen many of their early film works produced by Japanese American filmmakers in the 1970s-1980s for the JACL audience.
Since the early 1970s Little Tokyo has been a hotbed for Asian American independent film production, in part because of its proximity to Hollywood, but more so because Visual Communications is located there. To those unfamiliar with VC, they are the oldest AAPI media advocacy organization in the country, founded in 1970 by a group of recent graduates from UCLA’s Ethno-Communications Program. Founding members include Duane Kubo, Robert Nakamura, Alan Ohashi, and Eddie Wong.
The relationship between VC and JACL dates back to their origins when JACL National approached then UCLA Film school student Robert Nakamura in 1970 to commission a traveling photo exhibit titled, “America’s Concentration Camps.” Designed as a series of three-dimensional cubes stacked on top of one another, each cube featured a photo on one side and text on the other. Featuring archival photos from the war years alongside images produced by
Nisei artist luminaries like Mine Okubo and Toyo Miyatake, the cubes were designed to fold in on one another for ease of transporting and installing the exhibit from each venue to the next. With JACL’s financial backing, three sets were produced so the exhibit could run simultaneously in multiple locations, one of which is currently on display in JACL’s San Francisco headquarters. As a special addition to the convention film series, VC also exhibited “America’s Concentration Camps” in the lobby of the Democracy Forum throughout convention.
In partnership with VC, we presented a selection of their archival films shot between 1971-1980. Cruisin’ J-town (1975) directed by Duane Kubo explores the origins of popular band Hiroshima amid the political movements of the 1960s in pre-redevelopment Little Tokyo. This film was paired with I Told You So (1974), a short documentary exploring the life and work of poet Lawson Inada. We also presented Robert Nakamura’s 1971 short film Manzanar, arguably the first film in the “camp genre” of Japanese American films, which features footage shot during the first official Manzanar pilgrimage in 1969. This film screened alongside Robert’s son Tad Nakamura’s short documentary Pilgrimage (2006), which shows how the annual Manzanar Pilgrimage now has new meaning for diverse generations of all ages, races and nationalities in the post 9/11 world. The program concluded with a ten-minute work-in-progress clip from a new feature documentary that the father-son filmmaking team are co-directing titled, Third Act, which reflects on the legacy of intergenerational trauma in their family through the shared medium of film.
Of particular note was the 1980 narrative feature film Hito Hata: Raise the Banner, which was screened for only the fourth time since its 4k digital restoration of the original film print. This landmark film co-directed by Robert Nakamura and Duane Kubo is considered the first feature-length narrative film made by Japanese Americans after WWII, and chronicles the Issei experience from their arrival at the turn-of-the-century to wartime incarceration, and the postwar struggle to save Little Tokyo from redevelopment. Starring academy award nominated actor Mako Iwamatsu, the film draws on the talents of the leading AAPI filmmakers, writers, and theater artists of their generation to tell this captivating story in a way it had never previously been, and arguably, has yet to be told again to the same effect.
There were many highlights to this 22-film program, including meaningful conversations with filmmakers, actors, scholars, and community activists who participated in the making of the films. For me however, the simple act of hosting this program at the Tateuchi Democracy Forum, a screening venue that is connected to the old Nishi Hongwanji Buddhist temple where my great-grandparents, Obaachan (grandma), and her siblings worshiped prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor, fulfilled me in a way that cannot be articulated in words.
Meanwhile in Philadelphia, for the better part of the last decade I have been working on a long-term research project to piece together the history of Japanese American resettlement into our region after the wartime incarceration. I have written extensively about this topic for Pacific Citizen, the JACL’s national newspaper, and previously curated a virtual exhibition on this topic titled The Third Space: Japanese American Resettlement in Greater Philadelphia. I am happy to announce the recent opening of a new physical exhibit titled Okaeri (Welcome Home): The Nisei Legacy at Shofuso, that will be running through December 10.
Philadelphia is the sixth largest city in the US, but our Japanese American population numbers under 3,000. With this in mind, I have long sought the opportunity to present a public exhibition related to Japanese American history in our local region to educate Philadelphians about topics they might otherwise be unfamiliar with. This recently materialized as the new exhibit that opened on August 12, 2023.
Before starting my role at Japan America Society of Greater Philadelphia, I had no understanding of the pivotal role that Philadelphia’s Nisei leaders played in preserving and maintaining Shofuso Japanese House & Garden. In my first week on the job in August 2021 as I was perusing our organizational archives, I stumbled upon a typewritten 1983 board roster from the Friends of the Japanese House & Garden that included several names I recognized of now deceased Nisei leaders of the JACL.
A few days later I found an envelope of photos taken sometime in the mid-1980s showing Nisei civil rights leader Judge William Marutani at the 25th anniversary celebration of Shofuso. In another photo from a different event I recognized Sansei Teresa Maebori, a current board member of the JACL Philadelphia chapter. Following a few email exchanges with Teresa, I realized that there was more to this story than was publicly known. I shared some of my preliminary research in the 2021 PC Holiday Issue, and to what extent the Nisei may have viewed their work at Shofuso as activism, which was largely based on conjecture at that point. Thankfully the research phase of this project has unearthed many incredible finds that prove the Nisei did see their work as activism, and allowed us to better understand the role that Japanese art and culture played in Philadelphia’s Redress Movement.
The story that we began to piece together was one of institutional neglect and lack of cultural competency within the Philadelphia city government, who neither understood nor cared about the treasure that the Japanese people had gifted them. A particularly egregious example was a letter written by one of the Fairmount Park Commissioners in the 1960s suggesting that a Japanese family might be recruited to live at Shofuso rent free, as caretakers of the space – despite the fact that the site had neither running water or electricity.
Shortly after the bicentennial, Nisei Mary Watanabe organized a group of concerned citizens who wished to prevent Shofuso from falling into a state of disrepair as it had in the previous decades. They formally established the Friends of the Japanese House & Garden in 1982, electing Watanabe as their Board President. As an active member of JACL Philadelphia and past Executive Director of the Asia/Pacific Coalition (an early Pan Asian American civil rights organization), Watanabe was a central figure in the organizing that happened at Shofuso until her death in 1994.
From Watanabe’s archival writings in the board minutes and general correspondence, we see a leader who recognized the need for Shofuso as a physical space for the Japanese American
community to convene itself in the postwar era. One document found in the Watanabe files shows the 1983-1984 board demographics with respect to male/female, Japanese/non-Japanese, and Issei/Nisei+ generations. We interpret this as demonstrating the intentionality with which the Friends approached the topic of equitable representation, ensuring a diversity of Nikkei perspectives that prioritized historically marginalized voices within the community. Another document written by Watanabe in 1989 outlines her vision of what Shofuso meant to the people of Philadelphia, as follows.
“The House and Garden is a recognition of the multi-cultural society which is uniquely American – a symbol of people, regardless of origin, that have come together as one nation. For Americans of Japanese heritage, JHG provides a place to celebrate the arts, crafts, and holidays of their ancestors. It is a place to share a culture with other Americans. Its uniqueness as an art form contributes to the richness of American culture.”
Inherent in this statement of purpose are the concepts of inclusion and belonging. Sharing the culture of Japan with non-Japanese Philadelphians is an important factor in understanding the activist intent behind the Nisei involvement at Shofuso, particularly given the resurgence of anti-Japanese rhetoric amid the US-Japan Trade War during that era.
Of greater note perhaps is the idea that in Watanabe’s own words, Shofuso was a place for Japanese Americans to engage in reclamation of their ancestral culture. While many Nisei were so stigmatized by the wartime incarceration that they fully shunned Japanese culture, Watanabe and the other Friends actively celebrated the culture of their immigrant parents through their work at Shofuso. We interpret this as a meaningful attempt to heal from the traumatic experiences of WWII, by embracing the culture they were once vilified for coming from.
In addition to our research team’s interpretation of these and other archival documents, we also had the benefit of hearing directly from many of the now-deceased Nisei leaders through a series of oral history videos recorded by the JACL Philadelphia Chapter in 1994. While they did not speak specifically about the work that was happening at Shofuso, both Mary and her husband Warren Watanabe spoke at length about the influence of Japanese culture in their lives, and their approach to activism and community organizing. Other Nisei participants in the 1994 oral histories who were actively involved with the Friends group include Judge William Marutani, Grayce and Hiroshi Uyehara, and Tak Moriuchi. Listening to the voices of these departed Nisei speaking to us through the archive gave a new dimension to the project, and we began exploring ways to integrate their stories into a public exhibition.
Thanks to additional support from the Japanese American Confinement Sites grant-funded JACL/Densho Oral History project, our team was then able to conduct a dozen new oral histories with Sansei elders from the JACL Philadelphia and Seabrook chapters, many of whom are the children of the Nisei leaders who were active at Shofuso. The oral history documentation spanned the months of May-June and was captured by videographer and JACL New York member Brett Kodama. We then condensed these oral histories from 1994 and 2023into a 30-minute clip loop that contains select quotes exploring the wartime incarceration, postwar resettlement, civil rights advocacy, and topics related to identity and Japanese cultural practice.
Another component of the Okaeri exhibit materialized when the estate of Isao Okumura, the head carpenter who led the installation of Shofuso in Philadelphia, mailed us a collection of 8mm home movie film reels. Unsure what they contained, we had them digitized sight-unseen and were thrilled to discover over ten minutes of footage shot during Shofuso’s 1957 installation in Fairmount Park. In reviewing the digitized footage, I recalled another video shot in 1999 by videographer Keiichi Kondoh, which documented the roof restoration that was paid for in-part by individual contributions from Philadelphia's Nisei population.
These two videos together with a slideshow of digitized photographs showing daily activities of the Friends from 1981-1999 form the basis of a three-channel projection installation as the main on-site interpretive element for the Okaeri exhibit. Situated in the 10-tatami mat room at Shofuso, the 1957 Okumura footage is on the left, opposite of the 1999 Kondoh footage on the right, with the slide show in the center. The 30-minute oral history clip loop plays aloud on speakers along with original audio of the roofers working in Kondoh's footage.
The 10-mat tatami room also contains a custom-built low-rise table that encompasses the projector setup, presenting a clean view of the traditional Japanese interior that allows exhibit goers to focus on the material being projected. The table surface also doubles as a reading area for visitors to sit on the tatami floor and peruse the exhibit catalogue or simply immerse themselves in the multimedia installation. Additional reading materials are available to visitors including a glossary of terminology, including definitions of euphemistic language used by the WRA and preferred terms by the Japanese American community to describe wartime incarceration, and several primary source documents from the mid-1940s related to Japanese American resettlement in the Philadelphia area.
Other on-site displays include the exhibit title card located just outside of the 10-mat installation, which describes the Okaeri exhibit and acknowledges our funders, and a large format graphic timeline depicting key events related to the exhibit that is located in the adjacent room of the house. The last physical component of the exhibit are two museum quality display cases containing artifacts related to the wartime incarceration (camp art and photos taken in camp), Redress brochures and publications (owned by members of the Friends group), and certain key documents related to the Friends that spanned the same time period. This room also contains a reproduction of the "evacuation notice" and wooden planks that were signed by the Japanese carpenters and roofers who build Shofuso in 1957 and restored the roof in 1999, tying together elements from the projection installation with a physical presence in the house.
Included in the display case is a class photograph of FJHG board member Reiko Nakawatase Gaspar alongside her elementary schoolmates at a Japanese garden in Poston Camp 1. To me this is one of the most significant pieces of the exhibit, showing if only by chance how this one
woman gravitated back to the traditional culture of Japan despite the incredible hardships that the Japanese American community’s association with Japan brought on her and her family. Reiko was a West Philly public school teacher who also served as JACL Philadelphia Board President in the mid-1980s. While active in both FJHG and JACL, she co-curated a special exhibition alongside Mary Watanabe titled “The Japanese American Experience” at the Balch Institute of Ethnic Studies – the first such exhibit in Philadelphia. Reiko’s personal copy of the exhibit catalogue is included in the display case alongside her childhood photo.
As we were installing the projectors at Shofuso I began testing random videos from our Google drive and stumbled upon a 1987 video recording of a tour given by none other than Reiko Nakawatase Gaspar. While we had digitized dozens of Reiko’s photographs and researched extensively her involvement in the Friends group, this was the first time I had seen footage of her or heard her voice. It sent shivers down my spine, in the best possible way, to feel as if her presence was with us in that moment.
Yet this was essentially the intent of launching our exhibit when we did on August 12, in tandem with Philadelphia's Obon Festival held just outside of Shofuso. The title of our exhibit was chosen to both recognize the community home that Shofuso became for the Nisei generation, but also to invite their stories back into the cultural memory of the site. For these reasons, Obon Festival was chosen as the launch date to recognize the Nisei leaders of FJHG as our movement ancestors in the work this organization continues to do at Shofuso.
We ended the evening with a lantern ceremony on the koi pond where participants enjoyed a koto performance by JASGP board member Mirai Yasuyama. In the background was the faint sound of oral history, welcoming the spirits and stories of our Nisei forbearers back to Shofuso.
I hope to welcome many of the ASAM students and faculty to our exhibit, which is on view during regular opening hours at Shofuso through December 10, 2023. To learn more, visit the exhibit website https://okaeri.japanphilly.org/
