Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month

"Everything is alive. I want to make a record of things that are living, to add my small voice to the voices they raise." - Yasuhiro Ishimoto

Artists have always made unlikely activists, seeing what others overlook and naming what others can’t quite articulate. This year, we’re celebrating Asian American artists whose voices, bodies, and imaginations reshaped the world into something more accepting and more free.

Yasuhiro Ishimoto’s photographic work has been compared to that of Gordon Parks in that his haunting compositions capture human nature beyond words. His camera captures the social, political, and urban anxieties felt both in Chicago and Tokyo. To hear an expert discuss the compositions in his work, click here.

Pacita Abad’s artwork is an explosion of color and life on canvas. This Filipino-American artist is known for using fiber and textiles alongside paint, weaving through huge canvases to create a textured image. She has exhibited all over the world for over 30 years before her premature death. To hear and see more of her work, click here.

The paintings of Bernice Bing can be described “fluid”. As a Chinese American artist from the San Francisco Bay Area, her painting style, not only integrated her lesbian Identity, but also her Zen Buddhist practices. She is known for her art style called “calligraphy-inspired abstraction. To learn more about her legacy, click here.