Kelly Fleck

VANCOUVER — Interdisciplinary artist Cindy Mochizuki explores a variety of mediums to create art that engages audiences with Japanese Canadian narratives and histories. Whether through painting, sculpture, drawing, dance, film, audio fiction, or even divination, at the heart of each project is thoughtful and thought-provoking storytelling, often about stories and moments overlooked in history.

This October, the Vancouver-based artist was recognized with the Jack and Doris Shadbolt Foundation’s VIVA Award, a prestigious cultural award in B.C. The annual award does not accept applications or nominations. Instead, a selection committee from the art community selects three artists whose body of ...

In artist Randall Okita’s new project, The Book of Distance, he introduces audiences to a great hero in his life, his grandfather, Yonezo Okita. For Okita growing up in Calgary, his grandfather was always close by in Lethbridge. They visited each other often, and there were many family fishing and camping trips.

“He was a big part of my life, and he was also the quietest person I’ve ever met,” Okita tells Nikkei Voice in an interview. “I never saw him angry, and increasingly as I got older, I would realize how remarkable that was and how remarkable ...

TORONTO — Sisters Emmie and Lisa Tsumura have been using art to share messages of gratitude and love in Toronto and Ajax during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Emmie, an artist working in illustration and graphic design, has been creating giant pigeons and placing them around Toronto. These works of art carry messages of thanks to essential workers, especially those in often thankless jobs, such as grocery store workers, sanitation workers, delivery drivers and migrant farm workers.

Lisa, a kindergarten teacher in Ajax, created a learning garden accompanied by one of Emmie’s giant pigeons outside her classroom. The garden is a tangible ...

At 13 years old, Setsuko Thurlow, the youngest of seven children, organized her school paper and liked to read books recommended by her older brother, play the organ with her mother and learn English with her father. But her entire life changed in a blinding bluish white flash on Aug. 6, 1945.

A hibakusha, Thurlow survived the nuclear bombing of her home, Hiroshima. She has dedicated the last 70 years of her life to advocating for the abolition of nuclear weapons. A leading figure with the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), she accepted the Nobel Peace Prize alongside ...

TORONTO — On Nisei Masako Okawara‘s birthday, she looked out the window to see her two granddaughters and their families in the parking lot of her North Scarborough condo next to a sign reading, “Happy 100th Birthday!”

The rest of the day was filled with phone calls, flower deliveries, and a zoom video conference call with friends and family singing Happy Birthday, while she blew out the candle on an ice cream treat. Her five grandchildren made virtual flowers, since Okawara loves flowers, as one of the original members of the Toronto Ikenobo Ikebana Society.

It was not the way ...