From DiscoverNikkei.org
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Henry Sugimoto
Painter (1900-1990)
Henry Sugimoto (1900-1990) was born in Wakayama, Japan and immigrated to the United States in 1919. He attended the California College of Arts and Crafts, the California School of Fine Art, and the Academie Colarossi in Paris, France. His work was exhibited at the Salon d'Automne in Paris, the California Palace of Legion of Honor, and the San Francisco Museum of Art. While interned in Fresno, Jerome, and Rohwer concentration camps during World War II, he taught high school art classes. After the war, he resettled in New York City and worked as an artist and fabric designer. Sugimoto's works depict California, New York, Mexico, and France, as well as Fresno detention center in central California and Jerome and Rohwer concentration camps in Arkansas. He has received numerous awards until he died at the age of 90 on May 8, 1990 at his home in New York. Now his paintings have been exhibited in many public and private galleries in the united States, Europe, and Japan.
- Bernard Weinraub, "Arts in America: Japanese-American Gloom on Canvas, Circa '42". New York Times, March 28, 2001.
- Excerpt: "Several months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Henry Sugimoto, his wife and their 6-year-old daughter were interned with other Japanese-Americans in California and sent to an assembly center in Fresno. Mr. Sugimoto had been a rising artist, trained in France and known as a painter of the placid fields and lush landscapes of rural California. Almost as soon as he was interned he began sketching somber portraits of the Japanese-American families devastated by government policy."
- Harsh Canvas: The Art & Life of Henry Sugimoto (Japanese American National Museum; Color VHS, 30 min.)
- Sugimoto's translated memoirs, brought to life by Academy Award nominated actor Mako, reveal the artist's own journey through his life and art. Features his paintings and sketches, rare archival footage, and film of the artist just before his death. Produced for the exhibition Henry Sugimoto: Painting an American Experience.
- Martin St.-Pierre, "Henry Sugimoto". Wakayama International Newsletter (April 2003).
- "Born in Wakayama, Japan, at the turn of the century, Yuzuru Sugimoto (1900-1990) left his home in 1919 to start a new life in America. There he reunited with his parents who had earlier settled in the central California farming town of Hanford, where he went by a new American name: Henry."
Works
- Henry Sugimoto Collection (Japanese American National Museum Collections Online)
- Includes full image and cataloging information for 138 paintings by Sugimoto in the collections of the Japanese American National Museum.
- Online Archive of California: Finding Aid, "Sugimoto (Henry) Collection", Japanese American National Museum
- ヘンリー杉本 コレクション: Henry Sugimoto paintings in the collection of the Wakayama Civic Library (Japanese)
- "Sugimoto, Henry" (New York University Literature, Arts, and Medicine Database). Includes annotations describing 5 of Sugimoto's paintings.
- Portrait of Joseph Boone Hunter (ca. 1943)
- Hunter was director of human services at the Japanese American Relocation Center in Rohwer (Desha County).
- Haystack of Voulangis (1932) and Winter at Voulangis (1931)
- "Henry Sugimoto (1900-1990) est un peintre Japonais, petit-fils de samouraï, émigré aux Etats-Unis. Il vécut à Villiers vers 1930-1932 où il peint plusieurs oeuvres de style post-impressionniste. On lui doit des peintures comme 'Haystack of Voulangis' inspirée des meules de Monet ou encore des représentations de Villiers, Tigeaux, Rampillon, Paris et Chartres."
Exhibitions
- "Henry Sugimoto: A Painter who lived in Japanese American History" (New York, The Nippon Club, July 10-August 3, 2007)
"This exhibition features works from Madeleine Sugimoto’s collection of paintings, prints, drawings, and photos to introduce his life as one of the Japanese American pioneer."
- "Faces of Japanese-American Internment" (Dayton OH, McGinnis Center Gallery, University of Dayton, September 13-December 15, 2006)
- Kristen Wicker, "Unwanted art". Past Scribblings: News and Views Archive, University of Dayton (July 2006).
- "Woodblocks by Henry Sugimoto, Japanese-American Artist" (Dayton OH, Student Union Art Gallery, Wright State University, March 26-April 22, 2006)
- "The Japanese American Experience, The Years of Internment 1941-1945" (Springfield OH, Wittenberg University Library, January 16-February 28, 2006)
- "Wittenberg University Associate Professor of Languages and Department Chair Amy Christiansen has organized events that give tangible proof of the effects of discrimination through the works of Japanese American artist Henry Sugimoto (1900-1990)."
- "Far East of Manzanar: The Internment Camp Art of Henry Sugimoto" (Los Angeles, Antioch University, May 11-August 1, 2005)
- "A rare series of woodblock prints by artist Henry Sugimoto are on display at Antioch University in Los Angeles."
- "Henry Sugimoto: Painting an American Experience" (Los Angeles, Japanese American National Museum, March 24-October 7, 2001; Sacramento, Crocker Art Museum, January 26-March 24, 2002)
- Exhibition introduction (Japanese American National Museum)
- Exhibition introduction (Crocker Art Museum)
- Exhibition companion book (partial)
- Review: Burl Burlingame, "Portraits of loss". Honolulu Star-Bulletin, April 13, 2001.
- George Takei, "Sacramento Roots" (blog entry, February 2002)