The papers of woodturner Bob Stocksdale and fiber artist Kay Sekimachi measure 19.5 linear feet and 0.125 GB and date from circa 1900 to 2015. Found are biographical materials, correspondence, writings, professional files, exhibition files, project files, personal business records, printed and digital material, scrapbooks, photographic material, and artwork. Of note are records from Sekimachi's forced internment during World War II at Tanforan Assembly Center and Topaz War Relocation Center from 1942 to 1944.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of woodturner Bob Stocksdale and fiber artist Kay Sekimachi measure 19.5 linear feet and 0.125 GB and date from circa 1900 to 2015. Found are biographical materials, correspondence, writings, professional files, exhibition files, project files, personal business records, printed and digital material, scrapbooks, photographic material, and artwork. Of note are records from Sekimachi's forced internment during World War II at Tanforan Assembly Center and Topaz War Relocation Center from 1942 to 1944.
The bulk of biographical materials are from Kay Sekimachi with some originating from her time spent in forced internment at Topaz and Tanforan camps. These records include identification cards, War Relocation Authority printed materials, and school records. Also found are awards, resumes, and blank stationery. Some materials are from Stocksdale's 85th birthday and memorial service.
Letters and extensive greeting cards are from friends, family, and professional acquaintances. Correspondents include Norman Anderson, Peter Collingwood, Jack Lenor Larsen, Sam and Alfreda Maloof, Forrest L. Merrill, Miné Okubo, Barbara Shawcroft, and others.
Writings and notes are scattered and include two interviews with Kay Sekimachi, hanging instructions, and notes. Writings by others are by Jack Lenor Larsen, Tran Turner, and Yoshiko Uchida.
Sekimachi's and Stocksdale's professional activities are documented through files relating to their participation at conferences, awards ceremonies, and lectures. Also found are fiber samples, order forms for materials and equipment, and notes on techniques and design by Kay Sekimachi. Exhibition records include extensive documentation on Marriage in Form, In the Realm of Nature, and Loom and Lathe as well as files for various solo and group exhibitions for both Sekimachi and Stocksdale. Gallery and institution files include material on multiple or unnamed exhibitions. Exhibiton documentation may include correspondence, writings, proposals, printed material, financial and loan records, condition reports, and photographs. Project files contain material for proposed book projects, a retrospective, and portfolio, by and about Sekimachi and Stocksdale. Also found are three commissions files for works by Sekimachi. A proposed retrospective on the work of Bob Stocksdale by Kay Sekimachi includes a digital sound recording of recollections.
Personal business records include sales books, purchase records for works of art by others, appraisals, contracts, consignment receipts, and insurance records.
Published books, clippings, exhibition announcements and catalogs, magazines, and newsletters are found within printed materials. Of note is a publication by the San Francisco Chronicle entitled "This World" which features illustrations by Miné Okubo.
Four scrapbooks compiled by Kay Sekimachi date from 1937 to 1944. Most of the scrapbooks contain printed material from magazines and other sources with images such as children, valentines, food, birds, clothing, and may include scattered sketches and notes by Sekimachi. One scrapbook dates from the end of Sekimachi's internment at Topaz and relocation to Cincinnati, Ohio. This scrapbook includes sketches and printed materials concerning local and global events. Loose material found in this series was likely meant to be pasted into a new or the forth scrapbook. These materials include relocation information, Japanese-American publications, maps, clippings, sketches, and printed programs.
The bulk of photographic materials consist of slides of various vacation locations and homes and date from the 1960s to the 1980s. Also found are scattered portraits of Kay Sekimachi and Bob Stocksdale, as well as a photo of Miné Okubo with Roy Leeper and Cecil Thompson. Artworks are largely by Kay Sekimachi and include watercolor and pencil sketches as well as designs for fabrics and a weaving portfolio. Watercolor and pencil sketches are of Tanforan Assembly Center and date from circa 1942.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 11 series.
Missing Title
Series 1: Biographical Material, circa 1920-2003 (1.5 linear feet; Box 1-2)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1943-2014 (7.6 linear feet; Box 2-10)
Series 3: Writings and Notes, 1960s-2008 (0.2 linear feet; Box 10)
Series 4: Professional Files, 1950s-2011 (1.1 linear feet; Box 10-11, 22)
Series 5: Exhibition Files, 1951-2015 (2.9 linear feet; Box 11-14, ER01; 0.125 GB)
Series 6: Project Files, circa 1900-2004 (0.3 linear feet; Box 14)
Series 7: Personal Business Records, 1970s-2010 (0.7 linear feet; Box 14-15)
Series 8: Printed Material, 1943-2011 (2.3 linear feet; Box 15-17, 22)
Series 9: Scrapbooks, 1937-1946 (0.9 linear feet; Box 17, 21)
Series 10: Photographic Material, circa 1950-2001 (0.9 linear feet; Box 18)
Series 11: Artwork, 1942-circa 1970 (1.1 linear feet; Box 18-20, 22-23)
Biographical / Historical:
Bob Stocksdale (1913-2003) was a woodturner active in California. He was known for bowls he formed from rare types of wood. Kay Sekimachi (1926- ) is a Japanese-American fiber artist and educator also active in California. She began her career in weaving on and off the loom and was part of the New Basketry movement.
Born in Indiana, Bob Stocksdale began his interest in carving by whittling with a pocket knife. Later, he created his own lathe with a washing machine motor and turned items such as baseball bats. During World War II, he was a conscientious objector and worked at various camps performing forestry work. It was in one of the camps that he turned his first bowl on a lathe.
After the war, Stocksdale settled in the Bay Area of California where he established his own woodturning shop in his basement. He concentrated on making bowls out of rare woods. His work has been recognized throughout the world and in 1998, he received the American Association of Woodturners Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2003, he received the James Renwick Alliance Masters of the Medium Award.
Kay Sekimachi was born in San Francisco, California in 1926. As a high school student, she was forcibly interned through Executive Order 9066 issued by President Franklin D. Roosevelt which incarcerated approximately 120,000 Japanese and Japanese-American citizens during World War II. Along with her mother and siblings, Kay lived at Tanforan Assembly Center and later moved to Topaz War Relocation Center in Utah. She continued her schooling at Topaz and after 1944, was resettled in Cincinnati, Ohio.
After graduating from high school, Kay Sekimachi enrolled at the California College of Arts and Crafts and the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts where she learned the craft of weaving under Trude Guermonprez and Jack Lenor Larsen. Her early works were tapestries and garments. She later used her weaving techniques as part of the New Basketry movement to create baskets and boxes out of fibers. Also an educator, Kay taught weaving at San Francisco Community College. She received the American Craft Council Gold Medal for Consummate Craftsmanship in 2002.
After the dissolution of his first marriage through which he had two children, son Kim and daughter Joy Stocksdale, Bob married Kay Sekimachi in 1972. The two had been acquainted for many years as they were both craft artists living in the Bay Area. Although they married later in life, Kay and Bob travelled the world and exhibited their art together in many exhibitions including Marriage in Form and Loom and Lathe.
Bob Stocksdale died in Oakland, California in 2003. Kay Sekimachi continues to exhibit her work and lives in Berkeley, California.
Related Materials:
Also found in the Archives of American Art are an oral history interview of Bob Stocksdale conducted February 16-March 21, 2001, by Signe Mayfield and an oral history interview of Kay Sekimachi [Stocksdale] conducted July 26-August 6, 2001, by Suzanne Baizerman. Both interviews were conducted in Berkeley, California, during the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America.
Provenance:
The Bob Stocksdale and Kay Sekimachi papers were donated in 2003, 2004, and 2015 by Kay Sekimachi Stocksdale as part of the Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center. Contact Reference Services for more information. Use of original audiovisual recordings with no duplicate access copy requires advance notice.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
This collection is open for research. Access to original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center.
Collection Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Collection Citation:
Chiura Obata papers, circa 1891-2000. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing and digitization of this collection was provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art and the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation.
The papers of Japanese-American artist and educator Chiura Obata measure 3.6 linear feet and date from circa 1891 to 2000 with the bulk of the material dating from 1942 to 1945. The collection contains biographical material primarily related to Obata's family's forced relocation from Berkeley to Tanforan detention center and incarceration at the Topaz Relocation center; correspondence with family, friends, and colleagues; writings by Chiura Obata and others; material related to the art schools Obata established at Tanforan and Topaz; teaching files and professional activities; exhibition files; printed material, including TREK, and Topaz Moon: Chiura Obata's Art of Internment; photographic material; and sketches and sketchbooks. There is a 1.0 linear foot unprocessed addition to this collection donated in 2020 that includes correspondence, writings, subject files and printed material.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of Japanese-American artist and educator Chiura Obata measure 3.6 linear feet and date from circa 1891 to 2000 with the bulk of the material dating from 1942 to 1945. The collection contains biographical material primarily related to Obata's family's forced relocation from Berkeley to Tanforan detention center and incarceration at the Topaz Relocation center; correspondence with family, friends, and colleagues; writings by Chiura Obata and others; material related to the art schools Obata established at Tanforan and Topaz; teaching files and professional activities; exhibition files; printed material, including TREK, and Topaz Moon: Chiura Obata's Art of Internment; photographic material; and sketches and sketchbooks.
Biographical material includes Chiura Obata's school diplomas and resumes, as well as material related to his family's forced relocation and incarceration at Tanforan and Topaz, and eventual resettlement. There is a small amount of biographical material on others, such as records of memorial meetings held for Perham Nahl and material related to the forced relocation of Hiro Niwa.
The correspondence series consists of letters between Chiura Obata and family, friends, and colleagues, primarily while he was incarcerated at Tanforan and Topaz. Notable correspondents include John Boylin, Monroe Deutsch, Dorothy Parker, Miné Okubo, and Ruth Kingman. There are also letters of appreciation from students who attended the art schools established by Chiura Obata at Tanforan and Topaz.
Writings include diaries, lecture drafts, notes, and essays. Most of the writings are about art, but some are about Obata's experiences at Tanforan and Topaz. Also included in this series are translations of Obata's paintings and poems and writings by others on various subjects.
The professional activities series contains materials related to Obata's work as an artist and educator from his time teaching at the University of California, Berkeley, to the Tanforan and Topaz Art Schools he founded. Most of the series consists of teaching files, but there are other files on projects, commissions, inventory lists, and art donations.
Exhibition files include a range of materials related to group and solo exhibitions of Chiura Obata's paintings. There are exhibition lists, price lists, catalogs, photographs, correspondence, loan forms, clippings, printed material, and one guest register.
Printed material includes exhibition announcements, catalogs, magazines, newspapers, clippings and calendars. Noteworthy items include copies of TREK, which were published by the Japanese Americans incarcerated at Topaz; printed material related to Miné Okubo; and copies of Topaz Moon: Chiura Obata's Art of Internment.
Photographic material includes an album from the Pan Pacific International Exposition and photographs of the Obata family's forced relocation from Berkeley, the Tanforan Art School, and their home in Webster Groves, Missouri, after they left the incarceration camps. There are also photographs used in the book Topaz Moon and photographs by the War Relocation Authority.
Artwork consists of a few watercolors, sketchbooks, and sketches, some of which were created during Obata's incarceration at Topaz. Other sketches were done for commercial work in St. Louis. There is an autograph book containing sketches and paintings by others.
Researchers should note that the term "evacuation" has been replaced in original folder titles with "forced relocation" for more accurate historical representation.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged in 9 series.
Series 1: Biographical Material, 1894-1898, 1935-circa 1975 (Box 1, OV 4; 0.2 linear feet)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1925-1992 (Box 1; 0.4 linear feet)
Series 3: Writings, 1924-circa 1964, circa 1986 (Box 1; 0.2 linear feet)
Series 4: Professional Activities, 1913, 1924-1967 (Boxes 1-2, OV 4; 0.3 linear feet)
Series 5: Exhibition Files, 1925-1951 (Box 2, OV4; 0.3 linear feet)
Series 6: Printed Material, 1901-circa 1906, 1925-2000 (Box 2, OV 5; 0.8 linear feet)
Series 7: Photographic Material, circa 1891-1969 (Box 3; 0.2 linear feet)
Series 8: Artwork, 1917-circa 1945 (Box 3, OV 5; 0.2 linear feet)
Series 9: Unprocessed Addition (Box 6; 1.0 linear feet)
Biographical / Historical:
Chiura Obata (1885-1975) was a Japanese-American artist and educator. Born Zoroku Sato in Okayama prefecture in Japan, Obata showed artistic talent early in life. He joined the artist group Nihon Bijutsuin (the Japan Art Institute) and apprenticed with Tanryo Murata. Obata also trained in Western and modern Japanese art.
In 1903 Obata immigrated to the United States. He worked as a commercial designer and as an illustrator for newspapers including the New World and the Japanese American, San Francisco's two Japanese newspapers. In 1921 he co-founded the East West Art Society in San Francisco. He had his first exhibition for American audiences in 1928 and began teaching at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1932.
In April of 1942, as a result of Executive Order 9066, Chiura Obata and his family were forcibly relocated from Berkley to Tanforan detention center. By May he and fellow artists had established an art school with over 900 students. The school was successful and they were able to hold an exhibition outside of the camp in July. In September of 1942, the Obatas were moved to the Topaz War Relocation center, where Obata founded the Topaz Art School.
In the spring of 1943 in the wake of the controversy over loyalty oaths, Obata was attacked by another prisoner who considered him to be a spy. After recovering in Topaz's hospital, he was released for his own safety. He and his family moved to St. Louis, Missouri, where his son Gyo was attending architecture school.
In 1945 Obata was reinstated as an instructor at the University of California, Berkeley. He continued to exhibit his artwork and went on sketching and painting trips with the Sierra Club. In 1954 he became a naturalized citizen.
After his retirement from the University of California, Berkeley in 1953, Obata and his wife, Haruko, led tours to Japan to see Japanese gardens and art. He also gave lectures and demonstrations on Japanese brush painting and led tours through California. In 1965 Obata received the Order of the Sacred Treasure Emperor's Award for promoting good will and cultural understanding between the United States and Japan. Chiura Obata died in 1975 at the age of 90.
Provenance:
The Chiura Obata papers were donated to the Archives of American Art in 2018 and 2020 by Kimi Kodani Hill and Mia Kodani Brill, Chiura Obata's grandchildren.
Restrictions:
This collection is open for research. Access to original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Japanese Americans -- Evacuation and relocation, 1942-1945 Search this
World War, 1939-1945 -- Japanese Americans Search this
Genre/Form:
Drawings
Sketchbooks
Diaries
Citation:
Chiura Obata papers, circa 1891-2000. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing and digitization of this collection was provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art and the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation.
The Kikuchi diary : chronicle from an American concentration camp ; the Tanforan journals of Charles Kikuchi / edited and with an introduction by John Modell
