APAture 2023 Recap
Striving for Community in Autonomy
photos by Claire Burke
This year the APAture General Planning Committee came together in May to start discussing their vision for this year’s festival. Many of these folks were new to APAture and to event planning, but they are all passionate Asian Pacific American artists who wanted to build community and support emerging artists in the Bay Area. The end result was a celebration of many different artists, disciplines, and ways of engaging with our community in the Bay Area and beyond.
APAture 2023 ran from Saturday, October 14th to Saturday, November 4th, with 8 events in total. This year’s festival kicked off with All We Inherit, a Visual Arts showcase which featured award-winning installation artist Kiana Honarmand along with 14 talented showcase artists. The 2023 festival kick-off was well attended with over 200 folks participating in special limited viewing hours as well as the beautiful opening reception. Our Performing Arts showcase, Resonance took place at the vibrant SF OASIS and featured 2023 San Francisco Drag King of the Year, LOTUS BOY. Artists showcased a wide range of disciplines including cultural dance, spoken word, multimedia, and drag- presenting work that deepens our understanding of the human condition. Outspoken, our Comics, Zines, & Illustration showcase included ten showcase artists who were able to interact directly with attendees at Arc Gallery and present and sell their work, which included themes such as ancestry, healing, and solidarity. Our Music showcase, Sonic Memories took place at the intimate Lion’s Den Lounge & Bar and featured the lively Starry Eyed Cadet, among five showcase artists that included both live and pre-recorded elements. These artists brought together different musical genres to take attendees to the places, events, and moments that reverberate within us. This year for the first time, KSW also hosted an Open Gallery Sound Bath & Meditation, which took place at Arc Gallery and featured sound bath artist Xinye Lin. This was a gorgeous and immersive event which was complemented by a guided meditation from our neighbors at Mukunda Studios. The Film Arts showcase, Unearthing was held at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, with showcase artists presenting themes of family, loss, and legacy. This showcase featured acclaimed filmmaker Adamu Chan who presented his acclaimed documentary What These Walls Won’t Hold, about the Covid-19 outbreak in San Quentin prison. Seeking Home, the Literary Arts showcase featured Shelley Wong, author of “As She Appears” and 2023 Lambda Literary Award winner. Shelley and six showcase artists approached ideas of land, place, migration, and legacies of imperialism and displacement, reflecting the ways in which we conceive of home. The APAture Closing Reception and Artist Talk took place at Arc Gallery and was a beautiful culmination of the events leading up to it. One of the most important aspects of APAture is the community the festival builds and the friendships that form from the shared collective goal of creating a more autonomous Asian Pacific American Arts community.
We would like to thank everyone involved with APAture, each committee member, each artist, each volunteer, and, of course, all the audience members. APAture is a festival committed to the community and without each person’s collective efforts the events would not have been the same. If you would like to get involved with Kearny Street Workshop or future APAture events, please sign up here.
As the year comes to a close, we kindly ask you to consider Kearny Street Workshop for your end of year giving.Thank you to everyone’s ongoing support of APAture and Kearny Street Workshop! We can’t wait to keep working and supporting emerging Asian Pacific American artists!
With gratitude and in community,
Analicia Hawkins, APAture 2023 Coordinator
Participating Artists
Visual Arts
*Kiana Honarmand,Ahn Lee, Tanza Brian Kwon, Bushra Gill, Carey Lin and Gabriel Gilder, Connie Cagampang Heller, Denver Gacayan, Hope Meng, Ishita Mitra, Jocelyn Wong, Leyla Rzaveva, Michelle Lin, Ngân Vũ
Performing Arts
*LOTUS Boy, Marwa Doost, Kim Requesto, Meghana Ravikumar, SF Adavu, Xinye Lin
Literary Arts
*Shelley Wong, Rowena Leong Singer, Nicola Andrews, K Dulai, Lucie Pereira, Danica Li, Alder Duan Hurley
Comics, Zines, & Illustrations
Nicolette McConn, Havannah Tran, bao diep, Jasmin Regato, Jane Trieu, Sean Lin, Yuting Wang, Sapphic Bushtit, Ann Chen
Music
Amihan, Bersea, Mayari, Noah Kawaguchi, Scott Oshiro, Starry Eyed Cadet
Film
*Adamu Chan, Yasmine Gomez, Tracy Nguyen, Jinji S., Sabina Kariat, Jalena Keane-Lee
GENERAL PLANNING COMMITTEE
Analicia Hawkins (Festival Coordinator)
Steph Gervacio
Noah Kawaguchi
Julie Villanueva
Hannah Chea
Waeli Wang
Julie Fukunaga
Sarah Halabe
Jen Woo
Ishita Mitra
Annie Gao
Asela Kemper
Christine Phan
Sarah Halabe
KSW STAFF
Jason Bayani, Co-Director
Mihee Kim, Co-Director
Analicia Hawkins, program coordinator
KSW Board
Paul Ocampo
Robynn Takayama
Cristiana Baik
Lawrence Liu
Jenny Ton
Amanda Chaudhary
Nina Asay
Irene Gutierrez
Joshua Wheeler
PHOTO & VIDEOGRAPHY
Claire Burke
Ivy Chen
CO-PRESENTERS
Arc Gallery & Studios
Kultivate Labs
SF Oasis
Lion’s Den Lounge
YBCA
FUNDERS
San Francisco Arts Commission
Zellerbach Family Foundation
Grants for the Arts
MOHCD
SPECIAL THANKS
Charlene Tan
Fort Point Brewing
Mukunda Studios
Vincent Kurniawidjaja
Clary Ahn