We visited the Umami Art Exhibit at the Nikkei National Museum this past weekend when we attended the Nikkei Matsuri celebration. I was surprised by an artwork by Marlene Howell entitled Mourning Sky. It was a painting of confiscated Japanese Canadian fishing boats surrounded by a collage of letters and fishing boat registry pages from my grandfather Kishizo Kimura.

It was beautiful and thought-provoking. I sent an email to the artist enquiring how and why she selected my grandfather’s documents. She replied that she found them by researching through the Landscapes of Injustice project work and the Nikkei National Museum archives. She wanted to portray the sadness of this day.

I would never have thought that my grandfather’s work documents would be turned into art!