The University of Kansas

Roger Shimomura

United States, born 1939
Minidoka #3, 1978
Acrylic on canvas
University of Kansas Endowment Association, 79.51

Like many Japanese Americans, Roger Shimomura was confined with his family in an internment camp during World War II. Some of his art relates to the loss of freedom and human dignity suffered by Japanese Americans during this period. Camp diaries kept by his grandmother Toku Shimomura inspired Minidoka #3 (Diary). The painting shows her writing in the journal (an act forbidden by the government) while Roger’s mother walks with him in the background. Shimomura combines a satirical Pop Art style of Japanese woodblock print images, combining the two cultures in which he grew up.