<Begin Segment 63>

AI: Maybe at this point you can come back to that question about the different response at the different venues?

RS: Right, right. The biggest contrast, of course, what when it went to the Mississippi Art Museum, and I'll preface that by saying that I wanted it to go to the Arkansas Art Center because when I think of the deep South, or the southern part of the country, the first place that's really credible from an artistic standpoint -- and there aren't too many in the deep South -- is the Arkansas Art Center, 'cause I knew that place had history, it had been there a long time. And then I found that it was only fifty miles from Rohwer and Jerome. So I thought, "Well this is perfect." So I called them up and offered 'em the exhibition and told them, "It'll be free, it'll come to your doorstep, all you have to do is hang it and then repack it at the end." And they said, "We'll call you back." And they called me back in two days and said, "We're not interested." They just blew me off. And I was very upset. And I really didn't know what other venues were available in the South. And so Mississippi, Mississippi Art Museum, I thought, well, I'll try that, in Jackson. And they agreed to take it. And so when I went there, when the show eventually worked its way around to the Mississippi Art Museum, I went down there and it was like I had stepped off of the moon. And it was clear that this was fulfilling one of their PC multiculture requirements, some end-of-the-year report or something. The turnout at the opening was absolutely poor. The turnout to my lecture was even worse. And people were just didn't, really didn't care, half of the people walked out as soon as I started talking and it was just awful. And even the host of the exhibition, the curator of the museum, his boyfriend was there and the two of them were talking all through my lecture in the back. And when my lecture was over he came up to me and said, "Do you know how to find your way back to your hotel?" And I said, "Yeah," because I had walked there, because I didn't know how else to get from my hotel there, 'cause I couldn't get a hold of him. And he says, "Okay," he says, "They should have a cafeteria open." And then he says, "If they don't," -- I hadn't eaten dinner. And he says, "If not, maybe I could take you to breakfast tomorrow morning, but you're leaving for the airport, right?" And he says, "Well, you could probably get something at the airport." And he says, "Since you'll be taking a cab, because I'll be busy tomorrow," he says, "Whatever. You'll find some way to eat, I'm sure." And that was it. That was the treatment I got there. And in contrast to the Japanese American National Museum that had the banquet of all banquets, with what's his name? Zulu or what --

MT: George Takei.

RS: George Takei introduced me and it's like we were old buddies or something and all those people, and then just the general buzz about the show and all of that. I mean, what a contrast. And of course I opened it in Philadelphia at the National JACL Conference there and that was at the recommendation of William...

AI: Marutani?

RS: Marutani. Right. Was the one that suggested doing that.

AI: Right. Judge Marutani had been a member of the Commission.

RS: Right, right. In fact, he's the one that made available that statement in the catalog about the internment experience. He said that since it's government piece material there was no copyright so then I could reproduce it. So he was very helpful. So anyway, yeah, there was tremendous contrast. Every place I went it was different, in Indianapolis, it was different at Wisconsin, but, but for the most part, predictable. It was a great crowd at the Smithsonian. And it was a great crowd because there were several people in the audience that were delivered by my grandmother, so that added a little warmth to it. Even in Indianapolis I went to dinner with the JACL there and the guy sitting next to me showed me his birth certificate with my grandmother's signature on it. And I got to LA and JANM, and there were two people that came up to me and said, "Your grandma delivered me." And so, that's always a real nice sort of thing to happen.

AI: Nice personal connection.

RS: Yeah, and then when it went to Boise, of course, that was a whole another thing because these were a lot of the internees that were at Minidoka, so they were really connected to the work. And some of the paintings have very specific references in there that only a Minidoka internee would recognize, and they did.

AI: Well, in fact, I think I remember part of your statements in the catalog text have to do with forewarning some former Minidoka inmates that some of the details of the --

RS: Yeah, may not be, right. Right.

AI: And did you get any questions or comments?

RS: No, not really, nothing that was critical with what I did. But as I say, some of the clues, like that smokestack that everybody referred to, in camp, which I don't remember, but other people of course remember, I actually found a photograph of that and so replicated that and put it in one of the paintings and sure as heck there were more people from Minidoka that recognized that and commented on it. Another thing that was sort of a fortuitous, I mean, it was just... I don't know what caused me to do it but there was a painting that I did of my mother at Puyallup and in the background I put these roller coasters, just to refer to the fact that they were at the state fairground and I imagine at some point had roller coasters. And I found a photograph of Puyallup with a roller coaster in the background, and I couldn't believe it. And prior to that one of the former internees told me that, "Where did you find that? How did you know about that?" And I told him, I admitted I really didn't know it. And he said it was true and I didn't believe it until I saw the photograph. So there were little, some interesting sidelights like that.

<End Segment 63> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.