![\"rogershimfratrat.jpg\"](\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/rogershimfratrat.jpg\")
<\/span>Shimomura paints racist incidents from the racist’s point of\nview. The Asian male posing for the camera is a buck-toothed lizard. His yellow hand wraps the slender ankle of an all-American girl. Anyone looking at his paintings is seeing through the eyes of a white person who fears and loathes all others. <\/p>\n
Not me, you might say, and you might be right. But you are the one looking.<\/p>\n
Shimomura’s cold, flat style — a blend of Pop and Japanese (Yellow Terror<\/i>, 2008, acrylic\/canvas, 60 x 72 inches. That’s Shimomura low in the center, making slant eyes.)<\/p>\n Released when Determined to flourish in a multicultural society, Shimomura likes the Shimomura has a lifetime’s worth of experience with racism in all its From 1941:<\/p>\n This is to certify that _________ IS ENTITLED TO HUNT THE JAPANESE RAT, It’s the kind of material his parents’ generation shunned, but Change the joke and slip the yoke.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n (A Jap’s a Jap<\/i>, 2000, acrylic\/canvas, 36 x 48 inches.)<\/p>\n Anyone My favorite is not in the show:<\/p>\n Shimomura’s work is deep-freeze end of art’s attempt to grapple with racism. Compared to it, Robert Colescott<\/a> is sweet and Fred Wilson<\/a> Shimomura: <\/p>\n My emotions aren’t in my paintings. I don’t think When he shows up in his work without feint or painful comedy, it’s a shock. Below, Shimomura with his culturally-imposed shadow:<\/p>\n (Different Citizens<\/i>, 2009, acrylic\/canvas, 36 x 45 inches.)<\/p>\n Dapper white boys and comely white girls enjoyed themselves in the comic-strip version of college life until the late ’60s generation popped the bubble. In Frat Rats, Roger Shimomura painted the prelapsarian experience but added another icon dear to the hearts of the greatest generation: Racism. Shimomura paints racist incidents from the racist’s point of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1104","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1104"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1104\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nukiyo-e<\/a> — gets inside his hot subject to give it a deadpan edge.
\nHis paintings in his exhibit titled Yellow Terror<\/i>: Always a Foreigner<\/i> at the Wing Luke Museum<\/a> are windows to a demented world. <\/p>\n
\n![\"rogersjapallover.jpg\"](\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/rogersjapallover.jpg\")
<\/span>Born
\nin Seattle, Shimomura’s earliest memories come from Idaho’s Camp
\nMinidoka, one of the concentration camps built to detain Japanese
\nAmericans on the West Coast during World War II. <\/p>\n
\nhe was 5 years old, he grew up watching his
\nparents try to rebuild their lives. Even though since 1969 he has
\ntaught at the University of Kansas, he is, at least in Seattle,
\nconsidered a Seattle artist, partly due to his wide circle of family
\nand friends here and partly to his regular exhibits at the Greg Kucera Gallery<\/a>.<\/p>\n
\nmetaphor of a tossed-salad better than a melting pot.
\nNothing about him has melted, and that includes his memories.<\/p>\n
\nguises, from the bungling and insensitive to focused hatred. He
\ncollects its signs and symbols, including movie posters with luridly yellow-faced actors, Jap hunting
\nlicenses, slap-a-Jap cards, Jap dartboards, comics and grotesquely racist masks.<\/p>\n
\nand is hereby warned to exercise extreme caution in approaching this
\nsavage beast: it is a vicious animal and strikes from behind without
\nwarning. This animal has the characteristics of a skunk in appearance
\nand odor but has an appetite for women and children instead of small
\nfowls… In shooting this stinkin skunk, aim at its stomach, since it
\nhas lots of GUTS, but no heart or brains.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\nShimomura agrees with African American painter Kara Walker<\/a>, who uses
\nracist stereotypes in her work in order to defuse them. As Ralph Ellison<\/a> advised, <\/p>\n![\"rogershimjapminne.jpg\"](\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/rogershimjapminne.jpg\")
<\/span>Highlights
\nfrom that collection are part of his exhibit at Wing Luke. He donated
\nit to the museum, and his collection of internment diaries to the Smithsonian National Museum of American History<\/a>. <\/p>\n
\nreaching the comforting conclusion that the racism Shimomura explores
\nis past will shed it when perusing selections from his series, Stereotypes and Admonitions<\/i>, shown at Kucera in 2004 and in an abbreviated form at Wing Luke. Beside each painting was a note on its origin.<\/p>\n![\"rogershimomuraheapbird.jpg\"](\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/rogershimomuraheapbird.jpg\")
<\/span>In the 1990s, he walked into the administration building at the University
\nof Kansas to sign in his friend, Edgar Heap-of-Birds<\/a>, who was an artist
\nin residence. An administrator peered out at them and said loudly to
\nthe receptionist, “I want you to check the IDs of those two characters
\nout there.”
\nBoth men were startled. “We looked at each other,” said Shimomura.
\n“What did he say? There’s that moment of incredulity, where you can’t
\nbelieve what you just heard.”
\nIn the painting, he’s an old Japanese warrior and Heap-of-Birds is in
\nfull headdress. <\/p>\n
\nheated. We know looking at a Colescott or Wilson where they stand. Even
\nthough Shimomura frequently paints himself into his narratives, he’s
\nrarely there. <\/p>\n
\npeople care about my emotions. Why would they? Painting allows me to
\napproach this subject in a dispassionate way. It’s almost like
\nreporting. This is what is out there. It’s dirty work, but I’m
\ncompelled to do it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n![\"rogersjapselfsolid.jpg\"](\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/rogersjapselfsolid.jpg\")
<\/span>Through April 18. Jen Graves’ review here<\/a>. Michael Upchurch feature here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"