Arts to End Violence, Uptown Arts Review, and More Exhibitions

Memorial day

It has become a very beautiful time of year to go outside. I feel the life force of plants that grow beyond the boundary. On May 27th, 2016, Barack Obama became the first sitting US president to visit Hiroshima since its 1945 nuclear bombing. He paid respect to the victims of the world's first atomic bomb deployment. Veterans For Peace responded to Obama at Hiroshima with an apology from Veterans For Peace to the Japanese people and the world, and they called for Nuclear Disarmament in their Lifetime. There are many Americans who are atomic bomb victims such as soldiers, scientists, and Native Americans in the United States. 

“Nobody wins a war.” 

I hope you have a peaceful Memorial Day !

Yasuyo

Arts to End Violence

The Crown Heights Community Mediation Center works to strengthen this neighborhood by making it safer and healthier for all residents. They asked young people and adults to submit pieces of art featuring messages of peace, community, and nonviolence such as the fight against gun violence.

The art opening was blessed with a large number of people. While listening to live jazz music, people were enjoying art, food, and their conversations. I heard from the audience who lives in this neighborhood that Crown Heights has become safer than before.This community seemed like one big family.

Brooklyn was the first place I lived in the USA. In those days, I had been told to not ride the subway after midnight. It was an era of danger and tension. I participated in the exhibition "Arts to End Violence” because I remembered my dangerous experience and my poem that I made at that time. Also, the shooting death of a Japanese foreign student was terribly shocking and frightening. I made a new piece with my statement about gun violence for the exhibition.

OTHER SELF

Look 

can you see

yourself

dimly seen muddy seen

or more clear

you want to know

yourself

you run after

you run before

you can not catch yourself

you can catch

only others

go through inside you

only others

Look 

can you see

yourself

inside others

i reflect 

you mirror

DON’T BREAK!

My white embossed poem “other self" represents invisible mental scenery. I aim to interact with the viewers' mind. I wrote this poem around the time I met Tommy Trantino, who was in prison on charges of killing 2 police officers. I got to know Tommy because of my interest in his paintings. We talked about keys at our first meeting while he was still in prison. He asked, “what do you want to do with your art?” I answered, "people have a door inside them. I want to open it, if their door is closed.” He said, “you can’t open their door, but you can give them keys”. I can’t change people. I can only change myself. In order to give people keys, I started rethinking about myself and others and tried to imagine myself in their position.

Guns and keys

When I began living in the USA as an international student, there was a hot topic in the press, a Japanese student was shot to death in the USA. Yoshihiro Hattori was an exchange student residing in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, USA. On October 17, 1992, on his way to a Halloween party, he went to the wrong house by accident. The property owner, Rodney Peairs, shot and killed Yoshihiro, thinking he was trespassing with criminal intent. This homicide and Peairs' acquittal in the state court of Louisiana received worldwide attention. After the trial, Peairs told the press that he would never again own a gun. However, this same kind of incident occurs frequently in the USA.

Living in the melting pot of New York City, I have become aware of the necessity for having many more keys than in Japan. Security concerns are heightened at this time of increased immigration. If America's gun society was born from the key society, the answer to changing the gun society might begin from thinking about why we need keys.

Arts to End Violence
May 19 Thursday  6:30-8:30pm Opening

Gallery Walk-In Hours:
Wednesday, May 23 from 3 PM - 6 PM
Thursday, May 24 from 11 AM - 2 PM
Friday, May 25 from 11 AM - 2 PM
Tuesday, May 31 from 3 PM - 6 PM
Wednesday, June 1 from 3 PM - 6 PM
Thursday, June 2 from 11 AM - 2 PM

Ron Taylor Gallery
1160 St Johns Place
Brooklyn, NY 11213
For more info.Call Marlies (718) 619 4248
crownheights.org
soscrownheights.org 

Exhibitions

The Northern Manhattan Arts Alliance in Partnership with Broadway Housing Communities and the Sugar Hill Children's Museum of Art and Storytelling, present the exhibition "Uptown Arts Review" that is a part of Uptown Arts Stroll 2016.

Uptown Arts Review
Curated by Andrea Arroyo
June 6 Monday -30 Thursday, 10am-5pm
June 6 Monday 6-9pm Opening
June 20 Monday 6-8pm Artist talk and workshop
Rio II Gallery, 583 Riverside Drive (at 135th Street),
New York, NY 10031.
Northern Manhattan Arts Alliance
info@nomaanyc.org

Fatale
Women printmakers of  Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop
Curated by Jazmine Catasus
May 5-31
May 5 Thursday Opening 7-9 pm
C’mon Everybody
325 Franklin Ave Brooklyn,
New York 11238

from key to key
Period TBD  Please call 212-784-0694 to verify access
Hills Learning  Asian language school
315 Madison Ave on 42nd St, Suite 900 New York  NY 10017