Apology to My Japanese Readers

My article “Introducing Henry Fukuhara, the annual pilgrimage artist” (Painted My Way, Riosloggers, Dec 2013) was published in “Gunjo” magazine, a literary coterie magazine in Munakata, Fukuoka. Shortly afterwards, I was bombarded with questions asking me, "Where on earth is Manzanar?"

Among post-war Japanese, I thought “Manzanar” was a very well-known concentration camp for Japanese Americans during World War II. I've come to learn that with the exception of a few people, the majority of Japanese do not know where Manzanar is. None of the maps published in Japan show the name Manzanar in California. I wrote my article with the understanding that Japanese people knew about Manzanar. Wrong! I made a serious mistake. I was very careless not to have shown the geographic location of Manzanar. Here is my answer to those who inquired about its location. “Draw a triangle connecting San Francisco, Los Angeles and Las Vegas, and try to find the center of the triangle. That is roughly where Manzanar is located."

I detailed the route I took in 2008 to Manzanar in my blog in English. I wrote that I rented a car at the Los Angeles International Airport and headed north on 805 and swung east a bit to Route 14 toward Mojave. I stopped at Ridgecrest, population 50,000, where the Naval Air Weapon Center employs many people. I refueled and rested, then took Route 395 North to Lone Pine. It's a well known state highway that Americans take to go to the Mammoth Lake Ski Resort. Manzanar is located just before reaching Lone Pine. There’s nothing in Manzanar but the old high school auditorium that was turned into a memorial hall and a mess hall constructed a few years ago.

There’s no public transportation to go to Manzanar. The U.S. Government picked the site because of its remote location. They transported the evacuated Japanese-Americans by bus to live in the shabby barracks constructed in a hurry. The easiest way to visit Manzanar is to join the annual Fukuhara pilgrimage tour in the spring. Otherwise, you can ask a Japanese tourist agency to organize a special group caravan, but I would advise not during summer. If you think you can drive yourself and manage the language barrier, you can follow the way I traveled from LA. The total mileage is 500 kilometers. You could start either from San Francisco or Las Vegas, but you have to be careful where to refuel. You may be driving close to the Death Valley and there are no gas stations nearby.

A few days ago, I read a Los Angeles Times article entitled “Backtrack to a sad past for former internees” wherein a group of elderly Japanese Americans recalled the time 72 years ago when they lived in horse stalls at Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, California. Two photos were shown - one with the reunion team taking a tram tour, circling the track with cameras; the other, an old photo of two men stuffing hay into bags. I found a familiar name George “Horse” Yoshinaga, who was my favorite Rafu-Shimpo columnist. I see now why he used the strange “Horse” nickname. He wrote in the article, “I got my name here. They say it’s because I smelled like a horse.”

"Painted My Way" - Henry Fukuhara, A True Artist

Shadow of the distant pass;
Their memories still last
Manzanar: Monument of Tears.
Ignorance and pseudo-fears;
A wrong that can't be made right;
A blindness for lack of sight;
A day now engulfed by night;
A hope shaded, once so bright.
The memories still last,
… they still last

- "Manzanar" by William Smith

The best souvenir of my recent Californian trip was an art book "Painted My Way", designed and printed in 2011 by the APC Fine Arts & Graphic Gallery, Torrance, California. Phyllis Doyon, who has her studio and gallery in Camarillo, gave it to me when my daughter Yukina and I visited her. Yukina saved the local newspaper report of the "Painted My Way" Exhibition in Thousand Oaks during the month of August. I flew into LAX on Sept 2, so, I missed the exhibition. Calling Phyllis, the exhibition organizer, Yukina found one of Phyllis' works from the Exhibition still being shown at the Thousand Oaks Community Gallery. We dropped in after our lunch outing. Phyllis drew a newly built mess hall, which I wasn't aware of, on my Manzanar visit five years ago. Yukina and I, with grandson Ray, drove to Camarillo to hear what Phyllis could tell us.

It was the first time I heard about Henry Fukuhara (1913-2010), a water color artist and teacher. Henry was an internee at the Manzanar Camp with his family from Los Angeles. They all left for Long Island, New York when World War II ended. They were engaged in a floral business there until late in the 1980s when Henry decided to move back to Santa Monica.

He was an art oriented person when he was young. As Henry made the pilgrimage back to Manzanar, he thought of leading an art workshop with a number of his artist friends, welcoming anyone who responded to his lofty ideal, Japanese Americans or not. He conducted the first workshop at the age of 85 and kept at it until he was physically unable to do so. He continued even when his eyesight deteriorated and fell half blind. Now Phyllis, one of the chaperons, told me the "Painted My Way" workshop survived Henry's death and the exhibitions continue. She introduced me to key artists who succeeded Henry.

Upon my return to Japan, I checked to see if I had missed Henry Fukuhara's name among the Japanese American artists introduced in the two great exhibitions of Japanese American artists I saw in Japan. One was the 1995 Summer Exhibition held in the Tokyo Metropolitan Garden Museum (event cosponsored by JANM, LA and Japan Association of Art Museums for the 50th End of War Commemoration, with a tremendous collection of over 200 artwork, including Chiura Obata, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Dan Harada, Matsusaburo Hibi, Henry Sugimoto, and others.

The other was the most recent Smithsonian-sponsored "Art of Gaman" Exhibition held in succession at Tokyo, Sendai, Fukushima, Hiroshima, and Okinawa, since 2012. Arts and crafts items covered a wide variety of artifacts including tools, teapots, furniture, toys, games, pendants/pins, purses and ornaments.

When I found that Henry Fukuhara had not been introduced yet to Japan, I felt it my duty to let the Japanese see his powerful and inspirational work as shown in the book "Painted My Way".

His Manzanar days of less than 5 years influenced him greatly almost like an obsession. I know another artist from the same generation, with a similar obsession in Yamaguchi-ken, a neighboring prefecture to Fukuoka where I now reside. His name is Yasuo Kazuki (1911-1974) and his obsession was Siberia. Yasuo wanted to become an artist like Henry, but he was drafted into the army and sent to Manchuria. At the end of the War, Russians sent him to Siberia for hard labor. His Siberian experience was 2 to 3 years, shorter than Henry's internment at Manzanar, but he lived there with death all around him. Upon his return to Yamaguchi, he began producing prolific artworks (his Siberian Series won the Grand Artist Prize of Japan) which were all requiems to his friends who died in the Siberia gulag.

Kazuki wrote all the dreams I had in Siberia were about my old home in Yamaguchi. But upon returning home, all I dreamed about were Siberian scenes - heavy snowfalls outside the window; poor prisoners all with drooped heads treading leaden feet back to the camp; horrible dreams of dread of receiving sentences of longer penal servitude.

Kazuki wrote also about the difference between an artisan and an artist. An artisan is a person who chooses art as his profession, whereas an artist is a person who chooses art as his way of life. He humbly admitted he had a dual life as an artisan and artist, although he tried to be artist. Henry Fukuhara inspired 80 to 100 artists and artisans in Manzanar each year. That's something only a real artist can do. He was never an artisan. I sincerely hope the Manzanar pilgrimage will continue on and on.