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>> delphine hirasuna is the author of the "art of gaman," a book that features arts and crafts from the japanese american internment camps during world war ii. she showed us the items on display at the renwick gallery. her parents were interned at one of the camps where all ethnic japanese on the west coast were transferred shortly after the bombing of pearl harbor. >> well, the way the whole project started was shortly after my mother died. i was going through the garage and found this old dusty wooden books, and i looked in there, and there was this bird pin and there was some other trinkets. my dad served in the 442nd in italy, so he had a lot of little trinkets that he brought back from italy. given what was in the box i saw that it must have been made in camp, in the internment camps that the japanese-americans were put in during world war tie. but i liked the pin. i started wearing it. and a friend of mine, a designer who did my book, kit heinrichs

saw me wearing it one day and he said, interesting pin you have on. i said, yeah, i think it was made in camp. and he said, i wonder what else was made in camp. and that just got me asking around. and i have no idea the range in variety and level of skill of objects that were done in camp. ♪ >> more 100,000 men, women and children all of japanese ancestry were removed from their homes in the pacific coast states to wartime communities established in out of the way places. their evacuation did not imply individual disloyalty but was ordered to reduce a military hazard at a time when danger of invasion was great. two-thirds of the evacuees are american citizens by rite of birth. the rest are japanese-born

parents and grandparents. they are not under suspicion. they are not prisoners. they are not internees. they are merely dislocated people, the unwounded casualties of war. the time, spring and summer of 1942. the place, ten different relocation centers in unsettled parts of california, arizona, utah, idaho, wyoming, colorado, and arkansas. >> i knew about the camps. my parents certainly would talk about, well, we had that before camp. we had that after camp. but basically i think they were pretty much the norm. the japanese-americans, after the war they didn't talk about the camp experience. so, other than knowing that it had occurred, i was not aware of the specifics of it. when i started asking relatives, neighbors, or, you know, my parents' friends, what else would they have that was made in camp, they were reaching into their garages, into their sheds.

i grew up in lodi, california, which is wine country, and they were coming up with things that were still wrapped in newspaper from 1945. still in boxes from 1945. and they handed it over. so, obviously this was something when they got back to the war and they were trying to re-establish their lives, this was a period that they really didn't want to think about. so, they just stored it away, the way my parents stored the bird pin and other objects away. and as i -- as the objects were handed over to me and i -- you know, it made me much more interested in learning what the camp experience was about. unfortunately, by then most -- a lot of the first generation was certainly gone, and the second generation, my parents' generation, they're born in the u.s., they were pretty elderly. so, most of the objects in this

show were borrowed from the children of the artists who made these things, and the children are in their 80s and 90s. so, you know, it was a long -- it was 60 years that i waited to unearth the story, and it was, like, discovering it new because i hadn't really tried to learn the specifics at that time. >> the relocation centers are supervised by the war relocation authority which assumed responsibility for the people after they had been evacuated and cared for temporarily by the army. the relocation center. housing from 7,000 to 18,000 people. barrack-type buildings divided into compartments. 12 or 14 resident buildings to a block. each block provided with a mess hall, bath house, laundry building and recreation hall. about 300 people to a block. the entire community bounded by

a wire fence and guarded by military police. symbols of the military nature of the evacuation. >> the idea started as doing a book, because i had never done a museum exhibition before, and so it didn't occur to me that it would even make a good museum exhibition. i was doing a book, and i've written a dozen books. and this was another interesting project. i had simply started this with my uncle and aunt's friends and said i'm thinking about doing a book on objects made in camp, do you have anything? and one day my uncle bob shows up at my house and he opens the trunk and out comes all this stuff that was thrown in the trunk like so much kindling wood. people didn't -- at that point didn't -- i think with the passage of 60 years, it lost some of that sting, so they were willing to hand it over to me. and at that time it was still largely just an idea, so they weren't thinking of it, you

know, am i willing to display this. the early years, the '50s and '60s, i think people wanted to forget about the war. they needed to get on with their lives. they didn't want to have any kind of public or private reminder of what they went through. so, these things did get hidden away. and -- but, you know, in 2000 it wasn't as hard to ask them what they had, and it wasn't their parents that was, you know, that the niseis, the second generation that brought it out. the objects were done by untrained artists. they got it into camp by necessity. they could only take what they could carry. and the orders of what they carried had to include the bedding, their eating utensils and then you add in their clothes, it didn't leave for much.

so when they got to the camps, they discovered there was just a metal cot and a bare lightbulb hanging down. so, the first things they tried to make were just functional objects, chairs to sit on, just a woven basket to put things away in, you know, and so there was a lot of scrap lumber still available because they built the camp so hastily. >> scrap lumber, perhaps some wall board and a great deal of energy, curtains, pictures, drapes, depending on the family's own ingenuity and taste, helped make the place livable. >> people would gather the scrap lumber and try to fashion some furniture. and over time, because they were held in the camps for three and a half years, it evolved that they started looking for ways to beautify their surroundings, keep themselves busy. this was -- when i -- when i went to gather these objects,

and i -- and we talked about it, everyone said, well, this is busy work. this is a way to keep our sanity. this was a way to hang on to some sense of their own power and creativity. and so that's the function that this served. the bird pins were done in all tried to attribute all kinds of wonderful symbolism behind them, the yearning for freedom, and maybe that was true. but i think it was a much more practical thing. because it didn't take much wood. and people said that's when the fruit crates and vegetable crates came into the camp, they would take the edges. and you only needed, like, two or three inches of wood. so, it was easy to get the materials. they started out just sketching in pencil an outline of the bird, and then they would start

carving. they used this triangular file which they sharpened at the edge, and they just started carving and making a form. and what you see here is a more finished bird. and then they'd take it further, sand it, and they would end up with a really wonderful bird, which they painted. my understanding that because sandpaper was hard to come by, they would crush glass, glue it onto paper and use that as sandpaper. it was largely a male pastime. and there are hundreds, if not thousands, of birds still in existence. and probably a lot more that were thrown away. for inspiration, people saw an old "national geographic." i understand that so many people wrote to "national geographic"

looking for that particular issue of the birds that "national geographic" couldn't understand why they were getting so many orders from patches that they never heard of. the other source of inspiration were the audubon bird cards. there was an exactness to it, and they are really quite lovely and inspiring. >> while they have many things in common with ordinary american communities, in the really important things, relocation centers are not normal and probably never can be. home life is disrupted. eating, living and working conditions are abnormal. training of children is difficult. americanism taught in the schools and churches and on the playgrounds loses much of its meaning in the confines of a relocation center. >> when the smithsonian called me and said they wanted to host this exhibition and i found that it was across the street from

the white house, it -- you know, we've come -- we've come a long ways. and, unfortunately, most of these artists are gone, but their children are super proud of being in the show. when we had the opening reception, there were about 100 people from california who flew out for the opening. and one man in particular who had -- his father made one of the carved objects in the show, he was 92 years old. when i talked to his wife and i said, you know, is this -- it's march. is this going to be safe for him to come out? well, he said, he feels this is a once in a lifetime, and he wants to be here. and he did fly out with his wife who is, like, 87, 88 and their daughters. and it was -- so i think that sense of pride. the number of lenders who came out, there are lenders who are

on walkers, and so i think that to be in the national museum is a great honor. and it's -- it's a validation of everything that they went through. it's respect for their parents who made these objects. and then i think it also says something very good about this country, that, you know, this is -- the subject of the camps, which was really one of the most terrible incidents in american history, the fact that it could be aired in a national -- showcased in a national museum, is -- it says something for this country, i think. it's interesting that so many of the paintings, especially by the non-professional artist which is like 90%, 95% of the people, there was a preoccupation withdrawing the camps, painting the camps.

you'll see a wallet. somebody had carved a camp scene on there, just the barracks. there's a purse in the show. and someone painted a camp -- the camps on the handle of the -- and it was almost a -- it's an interesting obsession, and the best i could figure out was that people were trying to absorb the fact of where they were and understand it. and maybe they were just trying to draw it often enough so that they could accept the fact that they were there. there's a photograph of a children -- pre-schoolchildren playing dollhouse, and what's ironic is that they are playing -- somebody had constructed a model of the camp barracks, and the kids are playing with the camp barracks. sews that -- i'd like to know myself why they did that. by and large, the non-professional artists who painted or drew the camps, never

put people in the scenes. it's very interesting that if you saw these drawings there, if anybody was in there, it was just a very small faceless, anonymous person. but the professional artists were more likely to put people in their scenes. as i said, there were very few professional artists. >> the relocation centers include many well-known arts. amateur and professional artists and craftsmen have used their spare time in creating beauty in many different forms. sunday church services, advanced preparations include carrying the benches into the barrack building. most of the alien japanese are buddhist, but almost half of the american-born children belong to some christian denomination, catholics, methodists, presbyterian, except for state shinto, involving emperor worship, there's no restriction on religion in relocation centers. >> if you were a practicing buddhist, it was important for you to have a shrine in your house.

so, everyone had one in their homes, but because you could only take what you could carry into camp, there was no room to put your family obudsudan. when they got into camp the first thing was to construct something to put their ancestral tablet, to be able to worship properly. and as you can see behind me, they constructed it out of all kinds of materials. there's one made out of a hollowed-out log. i've heard of one made out of a cigar box. but the important thing was to put the tablet in there, to -- and a place for the incense. but -- so if you were a practicing buddhist, somehow you made something that -- you know, some form of an obudsudan.

there's one that is particularly nice made by the nishiori brothers. they were master woodworkers before they went into camp, and after they went into camp, they continued to make obudsudan, and one of t the one in the show is an example of that. i call this "the art of gaman," because gaman means to bear the seemingly unbearable with patience and dignity. when i went around to people's homes, and basically because these were objects done by untrained objects, the people with farmers and gardeners and shopkeepers, fishermen, they didn't see it as art. they hid it away, and when i talked to them about these things, they said, well, this was our way to gaman. this was our way to grin and bear it. and as i looked for titles for the book, i kept -- i was trying

out all different titles. the one i liked the best was "desolate beauty," which was nixed by the publisher. and in desperation i started to think about what people told me, and the one word that consistently came up every single -- every single lender said this was our way to g.aman. what could we do? we were there. we had to gaman. and at some point that it occurred to me that that was the title and the purpose of these objects. this vest is called ascending body. this stuff is called ascending body. and the -- when people started getting drafted or joining the armed services, which they tried to do even before, they -- it was a custom in japan to make some tie called ascending body 1,000 suches, and to wish -- to send them off with the good wishes of 1,000 people. so, the tiger stands for courage.

the french-tied knots, each knot had to be tied by a different individual. as people joined the armed services from the camps, these -- the descending body started circulating, and everybody put in one stitch, and it was sent on its way. this vest is rather unusual. it's done on silk. it's a vest. most of them were done on on rice cloth. it was much more humble, but my father's was on rice cloth. my uncle served in germany and italy, and theirs were on done on rice cloth. the traditional more often than not is on rice cloth sashes, but they went off to war with the good wishes of 1,000 people. and so each knot had to be tied by a different person. and these started circulating all over the camp as more and more people started joining up. >> the americanism of the great

majority of america's japanese find its highest expression in the thousands who are in the united states army. united states army. almost half of them are in a japanese-american combat team, created by order of the secretary of war early in 1943. some of the volunteers came from hawaii. some from the eastern part of the united states mainland where there was no mass evacuation. hundreds of them volunteered while they were in relocation centers. volunteered to fight against the mill tarrism and oppression of japan and germany. they know what they're fighting against and they know what they're fighting for -- their country an for the american ideals that are part their upbringing -- democracy, freedom, equality of opportunity regardless of race, creed, or ancestry. >> there are a number of paintings in the show and one of my favorites was done by an

established artist before he went into camp. his brother was either -- i don't know whether he was drafted or he joined the 442nd, the regimental combat team and he was serving in europe and he painted a picture of his mother with his -- some military -- the star in the background and things and he was also one of the teachers in the camp so if there were professional artists they were sort of asked to teach others whatever skill they knew, but this one is particularly moving because it obviously shows a worried mother sitting there in camp surroundings with pictures of a soldier in the background. there were two camps that were

built over the asian seabeds. topaz in utah, which was over the bonneville flats, and tuley lake in northern california. people discovered that when they looked at the ground and they just scratched it slightly they would find millions of shells, and because people got married in camp, they died and there was just this total lack of flowers, someone discovered that you can pick up these shells, sort them -- you'll see some very tiny ones and some bigger ones. sort them, bleach them and glue them on to some backing and make corsages and table ornaments. you'll see this wonderful samurai man in the show made out of seashells. this is slate, raw slate. a man was in topaz and there was a slate quarry there and he discovered that he could pick up

the slate and he carved these marvelous tea potsed and ink wells. when you see the raw material with which you started it makes it all the more amazing. he was a gardener in oakland, and after the camp ended he didn't carve anymore. eight of the camps were in the desert. two of the camps were in arkansas in sort of a swampy forest area. they were unpaved roads, and so it became a past time or it became a necessity in all of the camps to make these wooden platform sandals. and because the living quarters did not have a bathroom, a laundry room, a shower, when they went to -- in the morning when they went to the lavatory

they put on their sandals to walk there, and one of the enduring memories of people in the camps is the sound of the wooden clogs click-clacking across the ground and they said, first thing in the morning, the last thing at night what they remember is the sound of the sandals walking toward the lavato lavatory. carving was a big past time in the camps. there was a man from lodi. he was in camp in arkansas in a forested swamp area so they had ready access to wood. and he took up carving just as a past time and he carved this amazing cow. i love the cow. he was a farmer in lodi before the war, and after the war he went back to farming. he never carved again, which was true of so many of the artists who are shown in this exhibit.

they were untrained, they went back to their profession and that was a period just -- for a brief period of their life, they worked on the arts in the camps. because paper was in such short supply and people didn't have money, they used whatever they could for material and there's a water color in this show of the man -- the artist took two evacuation notices, taped them together and painted on the back side. what's interesting about it -- and it is a painting of tule lake which was one of the camp sites and he painted it as a gift for a friend who had chosen to go back to japan. and about nine months after people were put in camp, the government sent around what they call a loyalty oath and if you did not sign it, were you

supposedly supposed to be sent back to japan. keep in mind that two-thirds of the people in camp were american citizens. they were born here. and so to be shipped back to japan in to a country they had never been to in most cases, was ironic. but there are some people who were so incensed at having their civil rights violated and they chose not to sign that. and in this case, this man who came to this country because he respected the values for which america stood, decided that he wanted to -- he would go back to japan. and his friend painted this painting of tule lake as maybe a reminder of what he gave up. >> the war relocation authority

has been more concerned with permanent relocation. getting the evacuees out of the back waters of the relocation centers, into the mainstream of american life. so their labor can help to win the war. so the cost to the taxpayers may be reduced. relocation of the evacuees is not being carried on at the sacrifice of national security. only those evacuees whose statements and whose acts leave no question of their loyalty to the united states are permitted to leave all information available from intelligence agencies is considered in determining whether or not each individual is eligible to leave. those who are not eligible to leave have been moved to one center to live, presumably for the duration of the war. the others established as law abiding aliens or loyal americans are free to go whenever they like. thousands already have gone. here are a few of them. this man is examining corn for

insects in a field in illinois. this man used to operate his own orchard in hollister, california. machine work was a hobby. now it's his job. he's making precision parts for american bombers. this woman is a system head nurse in a large hospital. she was a teaching supervisor of nurses in a seattle hospital before evacuation. she has three brothers, all in the army. >> i started the project in 2000 and i've given a lot of thought to whether i could have done these things. i mean some of these are so amazing and when you consider that they're untrained artists or untrained crafts people, i don't know but i would like to believe that people when they are put -- and not just japanese americans, but that when they are put in these circumstances,

this is a way that there's always a human need for self-expression, to hang on to something that you could own, you can create, you can feel some sense of self-expression. and i think that's what these objects served, and i would hope that the people who come to this exhibit see it not just as something wonderful done by ethnic japanese but something that really captures some -- the dignity of the human spirit and i hope that people who come to this exhibition come away with not only more of what the camp experience was but really feeling uplifted by seeing what these people created. for more information, ll