Community Calendar

"During this special program, three contemporary Indigenous artists from across the country will come together to discuss their artistic approaches, points of inspiration, and visions for the future. Speakers include Dakota Mace (Diné), Cara Romero (Chemehuevi), Kelly Church (Pottawatomi/Ottawa/Ojibwe). Mace’s work focuses on translating the language of Diné history and beliefs while pushing the viewer’s understanding of Diné culture through alternative photography techniques, weaving, beadwork, and papermaking. Photographer Cara Romero uses contemporary techniques to depict the modernity of Native peoples, illuminating Indigenous worldviews and aspects of supernaturalism in everyday life. Kelly Church is a black ash basket maker, a fiber artist, and a strong advocate for the survival of Native traditions through her work in educating the public about the endangered black ash tree.

Mace’s multimedia piece Tsin Bigaan (Branches) and Romero’s photographic print Arla Lucia are on view in the exhibition For the People, By the People: America at 250, and Church’s woven black ash piece Every Dawn is a New Day is on view in our permanent collection exhibition.

Galleries open at 11am, and admission is included with the price of program attendance.

Ticket Prices:
KIA Members - $20
Non-members - $25
College students - $10"

Join us in October for an Art Detectives program centered around Resilience—A Sansei Sense of Legacy. This exhibition features the work of eight third-generation Asian American Artists whose work reflects on a time during World War II when Japanese American families were forced to leave their homes and live in internment camps. We'll read Write to Me: Letters from Japanese American Children to the Librarian They Left Behind, view the exhibition, and create our own postcards that can be sent to friends or family members.

"Join us for a Community Day focused on our special exhibition, Resilience—A Sansei Sense of Legacy. This show highlights artwork by eight Sansei (third-generation Japanese American) artists exploring the lasting effects of Executive Order 9066, which authorized the forced imprisonment of Japanese Americans during World War II.

We invite the community to visit the exhibition and explore the stories shared in Resilience. Visitors will also be able to participate in a hands-on art activity, available between 11am-1:30pm, and tell their own stories through a storyboarding activity in the library. This event is free and open to all."

"Sociolinguist Noriko Sugimori has often worked with her students to collect oral histories from Japanese-speaking World War II survivors in Japan, South Korea, and the United States. Their testimonies reveal personal experiences that have often remained untold and show how the past continues to shape the present. Drawing on video excerpts from these interviews, Dr. Sugimori will explore the stories, silences, and meanings preserved in wartime memory.

Dr. Sugimori is Professor of Japanese at Kalamazoo College. Her Mellon Foundation-funded Japanese-English oral history project was the first in using the bilingual Oral History Metadata Synchronizer. At Kalamazoo College, she teaches the Japanese language at all levels, as well as sociolinguistics."

"George Takei recounts his childhood imprisonment in Japanese American internment camps during World War II in this richly illustrated graphic novel. The memoir explores resilience and patriotism while connecting past injustices to discrimination. Blending history with storytelling, the book urges readers to challenge prejudice in America. Themes in this discussion will tie into the exhibition Resilience.

Please note that this discussion will take place one week earlier than our usual meeting."

"Jimmy Mirikitani (1920-2012) was a Japanese American artist who survived the trauma of WWII incarceration, the loss of family and friends in his ancestral city of Hiroshima, a harsh life on the streets of New York, and the chaos of 9/11 – all by making art. Sitting alone on a windy corner in Soho, he drew whimsical cats, bleak concentration camps, and the angry red flames of the atomic bomb. Blending beauty and humor with tragedy and loss, The Cats of Mirikitani is an intimate exploration of the lingering wounds of war and the healing power of art.

This film was directed and produced by Linda Hattendorf, who has worked in the New York documentary community for decades. Her editing work has aired on PBS, A&E, and The Sundance Channel, as well as in theatrical venues and hundreds of festivals. Produced in 2006, The Cats of Mirikitani was her directorial debut and won awards at more than thirty film festivals around the world. The film has a run time of 74 minutes. "