Adversity Leads to Art 🎨
The amazing, talented Ruth Asawa
Hi, readers 👋🏻
We’re learning about a true icon today! Let’s get right to it.
Ruth Asawa
Early Life
In 1926, Ruth was born in Norwalk, California. She grew up on a farm and enjoyed observing all of the plants and wildlife on the grounds. This would later inspire many of her works of art.
Tragically, when World War II struck, Ruth’s family was illegally taken and put into internment camps because her parents were Japanese immigrants. Ruth’s father was sent to a camp in New Mexico while the rest of the family was sent to the Santa Anita race track in California. Ruth, her mother, and five siblings lived in a horse stall for five months. And yes, Ruth said the smell was absolutely unbearable, in addition to the indignity of putting humans in horse stalls because of their ethnicity.
While imprisoned, Ruth learned how to draw from animators from the Walt Disney Studios who were also incarcerated. She was later moved to a facility in Arkansas, but Ruth continued to draw and paint in the new location.
College Times Two
After 16 months of imprisonment, Ruth was permitted to attend Milwaukee State Teachers College in Wisconsin through a special scholarship program for Japanese students. But, racism literally wouldn’t quit, and Ruth was unable to become a teacher in Wisconsin due to her Japanese heritage. 😠
After finish her teaching certificate, Ruth enrolled at Black Mountain College in Asheville, North Carolina. The best way I can describe Black Mountain College is a hippie dippie school where students called their teachers by their first name and determined their own curriculums. During her time at the College, Ruth and her sister traveled to Mexico where she learned how to knit wire into sculptures, which became her signature style. Ruth’s time at the College was pivotal to her career in art, as she was nurtured and taught by teachers who truly cared for their students and enriching their lives through learning and pushing their creative bounds. While at the College, Ruth met her future husband, Albert Lanier. We love an art school romance.
She’s an Artist!
After finishing at Black Mountain College, Ruth and Albert moved to San Francisco and got married. Ruth had a home studio where she started to create her famous wire sculptures. She often worked at night because she and Albert had six kiddos! She eventually started to exhibit her work at the San Francisco Museum of Art, Oakland Art Museum, the Whitney, the MoMA, and the de Young… to name a few!
In addition to her wire sculptures, Ruth also made many other forms of art including drawings, paintings, public commissions, and other forms of sculpture.
Andrea in Ghiradelli Square, San Francisco
Poppy by Ruth Asawa
Alvarado School Arts Workshop
In 1968, Ruth and her friend, Sally Woodbridge, co-founded the Alvarado School Arts Workshop with a $50 grant. This was a program designed to bring artists, musicians, and gardeners into public schools to inspire student creativity and individualism. It started as a summer school program in the school cafeteria. They used cheap materials, like egg crates and milk cartons, to help students create art projects. Eventually, the classes became so popular, they began to hold them during the school day. At its height, the program was in 50 public schools in San Francisco.
“Having grown up on a farm, Ruth loved gardening, and she wanted the children, parents, and teachers to share her joy in it and making art… We sort of take it for granted now that schools will have gardens with trees, vegetables and all sorts of things, but it was groundbreaking then.” -Aiko, Ruth Asawa’s daughter
Ruth’s Art Advocacy
In addition to the Alvarado School Arts Workshop, Ruth was very involved in other forms of art advocacy. She served on the California Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts. She became a trustee of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. Ruth was also instrumental in founding the San Francisco School of Arts, which was later renamed in her honor. She wanted the school to be in the San Francisco Civic Center near the ballet, opera, jazz center, library, and symphony so that student’s could have easy access to professional art forms.
“A child can learn something about color, about design, and about observing objects in nature. If you do that, you grow into a greater awareness of things around you. Art will make people better, more highly skilled in thinking and improving whatever business one goes into, or whatever occupation. It makes a person broader.” -Ruth Asawa
✎ Daily Drawing Practice ✎
Ruth was known to draw everyday. One of her favorite pastimes was staying up late and drawing while watching TV in the background. Honestly, iconic!
In her autobiography, Ruth wrote…
“Ruth washed the dishes, made the bed, and began to draw in her sketchbook. . . . She was happy to draw for hours. . . . She had eight hours to quietly look/study and draw a bouquet of flowers that Albert had picked up at Union Square the day before. . . . Next week it would be a different bouquet. He would find one that he thought she would like to draw.” -Whitney Museum of American Art
Garden of Remembrance
Ruth’s final public commission was the Garden of Remembrance at San Francisco State University. The Garden serves as a memorial to people with Japanese ancestry who were impacted by Japanese internment during World War II. The Garden has a boulder representing each of the 10 Japanese internment camps as well as a waterfall symbolizing the community’s resilience. Ruth worked with landscape artists Isao Ogura and Shigeru Namba to create it.
“I thought it would be nice if we could do something that told the story but not in a bitter way and not just as a Japanese story. This is a story about liberty and freedom.” -Ruth Asawa
Ruth passed away in 2013, but her memory lives on in her art and her impact on the world.
That’s all for this week. See ya next week!
Citation
“Your Hand is Already Flowing”: Ruth Asawa’s Daily Practice of Drawing by Kim Conaty, Steven and Ann Ames Curator of Drawings and Prints, Whitney Museum of American Art.
“Ruth Asawa and the Alvarado School Arts Workshop” by Alice Rawsthorn
“The Garden of Remembrance” San Francisco State University
“Ruth Asawa” Ruth Asawa dot com
“Ruth Asawa” Whitney Museum of American Art
“Ruth Asawa” Wikipedia
love her work!
That garden reminds me of Mytoi!