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SY: I guess we definitely want to mention the Toyo Miyatake film because of the fact that it's received accolades that are pages long. But I'm curious, was that an idea that you'd had for a long time because being a photographer at Manzanar, what was your connection or original impetus for that film?

RN: Let's see. I've always wanted to, 'cause he was one of the few role models I had when I was in high school, interested in photography, and later, 'cause I'd walk, go down First Street when the Miyatake place was right off of San Pedro and First Street, on First Street. And he'd have his regular portraits and whatnot, but he'd always have a couple shots of camp in his window. And I used to pass by and I said, "Oh, yeah, that's the tower," and all of that, and I'd think about that. And then later I saw more work of his, not only camp, but other things that weren't just family portraits, and I thought, "Wow, that's really good." And then I met him a couple times and told him I was interested in photography. So, yeah, I've always thought he'd be an -- I wasn't thinking of a film, but I just had an idea he'd be a pretty interesting person. So we got the chance to do it, and I forgot why we were doing it at the museum. But anyway, when we had the opportunity to do a film on him, of course I jumped at it.

But the film really took off in a different direction because I was always hearing the story of him smuggling a lens and a film holder into camp and being the first person to shoot Manzanar, and that was going to be the core of the film. But as we began -- and Toyo was no longer with us when we were doing the film. But as we were interviewing people, we realized that there was a lot more to Toyo than the camp experience and that he and a lot of other Issei photographers were actually involved in a kind of international salon photography movement and that these guys were published in international photography books. So only the back half of the film is Miyatake in camp and all of that. The front half is really his photography as art, which we never put him in the art category. He was a community portrait family photographer or camp. And then, and what came to light was it wasn't only Miyatake, there were like five other photographers that did beautiful work which we were able to use in the film, and that was a revelation, and that broke a stereotype for me of the Isseis being hardworking merchants, farmers, and whatnot, but not artists. Or if we think of them as artists, we think of them as traditional artists.

And then later as the research went on, there was actually an organization of Issei called the Shakudosha, and it was art, modern art, cultural modern art group that got together and talked about what was happening. And Miyatake and a lot of the art photographers were part of the Shakudosha. And then another part was Miyatake's connection to Edward Weston, and that Edward Weston's first exhibit, first show was done here in Little Tokyo put on by the Issei photographers here. This was something I'd never thought about. So it turned out rather than a film on Miyatake per se, it became a film on kind of breaking our own stereotype of our immigrant forefathers there. 'Cause I never thought they were doing art as modern art, contemporary art. I never looked at them as artists. So that's why I liked the film for that.

SY: And were you rewarded by the reaction to the film and was that something that, in a different sense because now you're...

RN: Yeah. And I think, I didn't intend it that way. There's a word we use, "crossover film," that relates to first our Asian American audience, but it has enough in there to hit a broader audience. So I think with the Miyatake film, it had that idea of the arts in there, and so I think it crossed over into... that they were part of the art movement and salon photography and all of that.

SY: And that was, was that a goal, or was that just something that...

RN: No, it wasn't a goal to be a crossover, but as I said, it was going to be a camp film about his experience, but it turned out more about Issei and the arts, immigrant Issei and contemporary art, not traditional art. So I think that's why it crossed over and it got into Sundance and other places, primarily because the art part was interesting. I mean, I get a lot of comments from non-JAs about that was what they were really interested in, that to them was interesting.

<End Segment 34> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.