Monday, August 22, 2011
MARVELS AND MONSTERS: Unmasking Asian Images In U.S. Comics, 1942-1986 Exhibition



Asian/Pacific/American Institute at New York University in collaboration with the NYU Fales Library & Special Collections presents--MARVELS AND MONSTERS: Unmasking Asian Images in U.S. Comics, 1942-1986 The William F. Wu Collection at NYU Fales Library & Special Collections

Opening Reception and Talk with William F. Wu and Curator Jeff Yang 
Thursday, May 26, 2011 | 6:00PM-8:00PM

Over four decades that included some of the most turbulent times in our nation's history, science fiction author and cultural studies scholar William F. Wu painstakingly gathered an archive of comics distinguished not only by its size and reach, but by its scope: It is perhaps the world's only, and certainly the largest, collection of comic books featuring images of Asians and Asian Americans. Marvels and Monsters draws from this important collection, recently donated with the help of A/P/A Institute to the NYU Fales Library & Special Collections.
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Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Enemy Alien: Confrontation with detention regimes of past and present.


As the 10th anniversary of 9/11 arrives, Alwan for the Arts is presenting a screening of Enemy Alien (outreach/education version, 60 minutes) followed by a discussion of the film's themes of shared struggle between Muslim and Japanese Americans in the face of wartime xenophobia and racism, and how this solidarity can inspire an effective response to the massive expansion of immigrant detention and deportation which has continued from 9/11 to this day.

Enemy Alien, a first-person documentary, is the gripping story of the fight to free Farouk Abdel-Muhti, a gentle but indomitable Palestinian-born human rights activist detained in a post-9/11 sweep of Muslim immigrants. Told through the eyes of the filmmaker, the grandson of Japanese Americans interned during World War II, this documentary takes on unprecedented intimacy and historical resonance. 

As the filmmaker confronts his own family legacy of incarceration, his involvement in the current struggle deepens. Resistance brings consequences: In retaliation for organizing a massive protest from inside detention, Farouk is beaten and locked in solitary confinement, and his American-born son Tarek is arrested in a counterterrorism investigation into the documentary itself.


A project of Life or Liberty
Directed by Konrad Aderer

Thursday, September 8
7:00pm
Alwan for the Arts
16 Beaver Street
Manhattan, NYC
 
(via http://enemyalien.org )
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Saturday, August 13, 2011
Workshop - How Asian American Sexuality As Portrayed In popular Media?


Community Service Learning Project Workshop of the Chinatown Health Center on Asian Americans in the Media.  AAAC partnering with CBWCHC to develop a multimedia project created by the student interns to develop interns' understanding of the "Model Minority" myth, how it connects to health disparities, and how these concepts can be effectively expressed through art.  

The workshop looked at how Asian American sexuality as portrayed in popular media and found examples of Asian Americans in the media that work against these portrayed images/messages.  

The public exhibition and reception will take place on Tuesday, August 16th, 5:30PM - 9:00PM at Red Egg Restaurant, 202 Centre Street, NY.



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Friday, August 12, 2011
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Nearly 15 million Americans claim Asian descent, and a new art exhibition at one of America's premier art museums explores the Asian-American experience and identity. The BBC's Jane O'Brien reports from Washington.
Roger Shimomura was born in Seattle at the start of World War II. When Pearl Harbor was bombed in 1941, he and his family were taken from their home and sent to an internment camp in Idaho.
They had lived in America for three generations - but the US government saw them first as Japanese and considered them a threat. Now, he is one of seven artists exploring the nature of Asian-American identity in a groundbreaking exhibition at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC.
"Far too many American-born citizens of Asian descent continue to be thought of as only 'American knock-offs,'" he writes in the introduction to his paintings, which focus on the challenges of being different in America. He confronts stereotypes through self-portraits, placing his own likeness at the centre of popular cultural images.


My Call to Arms . Tam Tran. Digital print, 2009
'Humour And Rage'
Shimomura takes the iconic 19th Century painting of Washington Crossing the Delaware, for instance, and substitutes his own face for the president's.
"There's a tension here between belonging and being outside that is essential to the Asian-American experience. In this work, Roger proclaims quite loudly that he is an American. His art is in a sense a kind of response to the experiences that he has felt living as an eternal foreigner.""When I look at this picture I see both the humour and the rage that is at the heart of his work," says curator Frank Goodyear.
That theme is mirrored in the work of 38-year-old CYJO, a self-described Kyopo - the Korean term for ethnic Koreans living abroad. Born in Seoul, raised in the US state of Maryland and now living in Beijing, she photographed more than 200 people, mainly from America's Kyopo community.
The scale and format of each portrait is identical - full length against a white background - a style that is in direct contrast to the subjects themselves, who share very few physiognomic features and reflect their differing social and cultural environments in the way they dress.


According to Konrad Ng, director of the Smithsonian Asian Pacific Program, such depictions force viewers to confront their preconceived notions of what it means to be Asian American.


American vs. Japs 2 . Roger Shimomura. Acrylic on canvas, 2010 
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