Home Community Aki Sogabe National JA Memorial Artwork

Aki Sogabe National JA Memorial Artwork

By David Yamaguchi
The North American Post

mage courtesy of Aki Sogabe

Local artist Aki Sogabe made two commissioned kiri-e paper-cutting artworks for the National Japanese American Memorial Foundation (NJAMF). The physical setting on which the art is based is the National JA Memorial in Washington D.C. (see “Tomio Moriguchi Reflects on His Friendship with Norm Mineta,” napost.com, July 2022).

The second artwork contributed by Sogabe is on NAP Japanese website here.

The backstory on the artwork is that Kristine Minami, a member of the NJAMF Board, remembers seeing Sogabe’s murals at Pike Place Market, depicting JA farmers who were forcibly removed from Seattle during WWII. Minami felt that Sogabe could similarly capture the solemn beauty of the Memorial.

The NJAMF reproduced Sogabe’s artwork as limited edition prints that will be used as gifts by its board. NJAMF is a nonprofit organization dedicated to educating the public about the JA WWII experience. Info: njamemorial.org

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David Yamaguchi is a third-generation Japanese American [Sansei]. He has written for the Post since 2006, at first as a volunteer, later as a paid freelancer. He joined the paper's staff in May 2020, when he began learning how articles flow from Word files through layout to social media.