APAture 1999
APAture 1999 Founder Focus Award group photo. Front: Sabina Chen, Annie Koh, Robynn Takayama, Russell Gonzaga. Back: Jean Chen, Manami Kano, Matthew Abaya, Ernest Mark, Nancy Hom, Claire Light, Jim Choi, Wei Ming Dariotis. Photo by Bob Hsiang.
Speech by Nancy Hom
Wow! 20 years! Who would have thought that when I started this program with the help of Jean Chen, Claire Light, and Annie Koh, that it would last so long? Back then we didn’t have many avenues for young Asian artists to meet each other and the chances of getting your work shown in a gallery were slim.
The first APAture in 1999 at Cellspace was really special. It was one big 12-hour marathon, with everything – art, music, poetry, dance, theater, etc. – in one location. Who could forget Dennis Somera reading poetry while someone shaved his head on stage? All those meetings, those late nights rehearsing and planning, those crazy fundraisers. My job, besides managing the money, making sure we weren’t going to be arrested, was stapling programs. We thought a few dozen people would show up but instead 700 people came. Thanks to the hard work of the first group of organizers, APAture was a resounding success.
Since that exciting time 20 years ago, APAture remains invaluable as a presenting venue, training ground, and resource for young Asian Pacific American artists in all disciplines. APAture has grown and expanded to multiple venues. The pioneer committee formed the guidelines and structures that have made APAture a self-perpetuating program. There was an influx of new artists every year, and the artists who have been part of the program continued to work on committees and helped train the younger ones. The graduate artists who got their first start at APAture are now some of the most exciting Asian Pacific American artists in the field today. And the experience of producing APAture has trained leaders who have gone on to serve as directors or board members of non-profit arts organizations. In this way, APAture’s influence extends way beyond the Bay Area.
APAture has had an influence on me personally. It gave me the freedom to leave KSW and embark on my own artistic journey. During the 8 1/2 years that I was director I had very little time to pursue my art. I was always so worried about KSW surviving without me. But the constant stream of young people at KSW energized the organization. Some APAture folks stayed with us to become leaders and administrators. I was confident that the organization would be fine if I left. When Ernest Mark and other APAture graduates joined my board, I knew it was time to leave, both for my own growth and for KSW’s. I went on to help other organizations, and I began to create the installations and large mandala art that I am known for.
As long as there are young APA artists who need to network and showcase their talents, APAture will continue. I am proud to present this award to the first Organizing Committee of APAture! Thank you for your hard work that paved the way for this groundbreaking program.
Collective Speech from the APAture 1999 Planning Committee
In 1997, under director Nancy Hom, KSW started a next generation artists group to bring Gen Xers into an organization founded and populated by Baby Boomers. KSW-Next started out as a series of salons that focused on writing, music, performance, and other artistic disciplines.
When the salons--which separated artists by discipline--didn’t quite bring all of our generation together, a group of KSW-Next attendees decided to organize a multidisciplinary “youth arts expo” which became “APAture: A Window on the Art of Young Asian Pacific Americans.” The first APAture was a one-day event intended to function as a quick snapshot of the art being made at that very moment by artists of our generation: APIAs between 18 and 35.
The self-selected committee spent the summer organizing, arguing, wandering the Bay Area with xeroxed submission applications, handing them out to every Asian face we saw. We ended up getting 50 submissions; we hadn’t really been expecting any. The event was supposed to last 12 hours, but went on for 15, and 73 artists presented their work, about 3 times as many artists as we expected to find. None of us expected the response we got to that one day show at CellSPACE—over 700 attendees! And they weren’t all our relatives or friends! It was like someone had opened a window onto a landscape we’d never seen before, and the landscape was packed with APIA artists to an extent we’d never have believed.
The festival electrified the entire APIA arts community. Through our work in organizing APAture, we forged a solid community of young and upcoming artists, launched careers in the arts and non-profits, and made friends and lasting connections. APAture also made KSW the unchallenged regional clearinghouse for APIA artists; for the next decade we’d be everyone’s first call when they needed to find, say a Hmong poet, or a Taiwanese filmmaker, or a Pakistani DJ … or a curator or administrator. We quickly developed an extensive artists database to keep up with our own needs, and the needs of the entire region.
That tremendous response showed us on how many levels an event like this could operate: as a showcase for up-and-coming APIA artists, as an early experience for APIA artists to put on their resumes, as a training ground for the next generation of APIA organizers, as a community-building event for the whole region, every generation. We immediately began planning the next year for a two-week long APAture, with a visual art exhibit running the whole time, more time devoted to other genres, and trainings for artists and new committee members. The second year’s committee of 23 presented 100 artists to an audience of 1000. And it grew from there.
In the summer of ‘99 none of us knew what we were creating. It was thrilling to see APAture take off and have a life of its own. Over the years, we’ve watched artists present at APAture, and then go on to direct and act in big films like Ali Wong; exhibit in prestigious shows like Stephanie Syjuco and Mark Baugh-Sasaki; create music, publish books, and even--in the case of graphic novelist Gene Yang--win a MacArthur “Genius” Award. Now, in its 20th year, our baby is all grown up!
For many of us, being a founding member of APAture remains one of our proudest accomplishments, and one that speaks to the power of a community to create change. This group of opinionated, ornery, and very different artists came together--motivated by a belief that Asian Pacific American voices need to be heard--to create something much bigger than we could have built alone. Where there was nothing, we created SOMETHING.
Many of us have carried on this spirit of APAture into our continuing careers: Robynn, who has returned to serve on KSW’s board; Wei Ming, who as professor of Asian American studies at SF State, nurtures and changes her students’ lives; Annie and Claire, who co-founded Hyphen magazine; Sabina, who lives in a very Republican town in New Hampshire and is working to flip it blue; Manami, who helped launch a new fund for journalists and publishers of color; Ernest, who helps grassroots, social justice leaders navigate change through a constantly shifting landscape; Matthew, who has taught several at risk youth video production classes on the peninsula and continues to make movies; Russell, who served as Poet Laureate of Lake County and continues to write and organize literary events; Jean who owns and runs a small art gallery in Alameda that very much reflects the same spirit as APAture. Iraya continues to build cultural arts, QTPOC and DIY community and performance networks up North.
We are all working to create change in our tenuous world.
This is the challenge for all of us--as artists, as activists--we create the change we want to be. We are living in very distressing times--an American society filled with racism, xenophobia, an impending climate crisis that people are denying. In these times, art is more critical than ever. Because art--the act of creating--is revolutionary. APAture provides a space for our art, vision and voice for our Asian Pacific American stories. Because our art MATTERS. Our music MATTERS. Our stories MATTER.
Speak out. Lift up. Make a whole lot of noise.