“A Line Can Go Anywhere”

Ruth Asawa’s first interaction with wire was on her family’s farm in Norwalk, outside of Los Angeles.

It was there that she bundled together bunches of vegetables with wire ties. Years later, Asawa would find herself again working with the material, splitting the skin of her fingertips to craft intricate sculptures that resembled otherworldly blooms, the forms expanding, exhaling, and narrowing again.

Asawa’s parents had emigrated from Japan to Southern California, where they grew beans, tomatoes, strawberries, and onions to sell at the produce market. Her peaceful adolescence was interrupted by the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the racist policies enacted thereafter. From 1942–1945 the US government incarcerated thousands of Japanese Americans, including Ruth and her family. They were incarcerated at the Santa Anita racetrack in the San Gabriel Valley, and later at the Rohwer Relocation Center in Arkansas.

In Ruth Asawa: An Artist Takes Shape, a forthcoming graphic biography of Asawa, author and illustrator Sam Nakahira finds traces of herself in the artist. Much like Asawa, Nakahira’s creative leanings presented themselves early on. Enamored with Charles Schulz’s Peanuts cartoons and the popular Japanese comics series Astro Boy, Nakahira loved to draw. As a quiet and introverted kid growing up in Torrance, mere miles from Asawa’s childhood home, Nakahira read the strips over and over and gravitated toward illustration, a self-contained mode of expression to interact with the world.

Asawa drew for hours every day while imprisoned at Santa Anita. Japanese American artists and Disney animators Chris Ishii, Tom Okamoto, and Ben Tanaka taught drawing classes for children high up in the racetrack’s bleachers. This encounter inspired the 16-year-old Asawa to pursue a career as a teacher and artist. She experienced profoundly how the power of art, education, and community transformed her circumstances.

In fall 2021, Nakahira attended All Is Possible, an exhibition in New York City that highlighted Asawa’s drawings and lesser-known works. Nakahira felt an immediate kinship with her. “Even though I don’t have any family connection to Asawa, to see her sculptures weaving through the air in a gallery space, I felt so seen, as a fifth-generation Japanese American and artist. But even before I saw her art in a gallery, I felt connected to her story and life," she said.

Although Nakahira developed a love for illustration early on, there were important detours in her path to becoming a full-time artist. She studied history at Grinnell College, where drawing remained more of a hobby than a serious professional consideration. Though she grew up in a diverse city with many other Japanese American families, it wasn’t until her time at Grinnell that she began a rigorous study of history and her personal relationship to the past. This was an essential discovery for Nakahira and her work.

“I only started learning about the history of Japanese Americans when I was maybe 19 or 20, holed up in a small college in Iowa, and finally wondering about my roots. I felt drawn toward history as a major, trying to develop a sense of myself. And then I felt tired of writing academic theses and thought I could explore history through art and illustration and ultimately comics.”

Asawa’s path to art was similarly roundabout. She initially studied at Milwaukee State Teachers College to become an art teacher but was forced to leave her degree unfinished because of racial prejudice. Due to this setback and at the urging of a close friend, she found a way to attend Black Mountain College in North Carolina. There, Asawa studied under artist Josef Albers, who immediately recognized her instinctual approach to art. He noticed her ability to discover the full potential of simple materials, to turn the ordinary into something transcendent. As a fellow student at the college recollected, “Most students there were art students; Asawa was an artist.”

After completing her first year at Black Mountain College, Asawa participated in a Quaker service trip to Toluca, Mexico. There, she observed a local artisan making baskets out of looped wire to carry eggs, fruits, and vegetables. Asawa was fascinated by the material and how it tested the limits of two-dimensional concepts while redefining the possibilities of a line. She brought the looping technique back to Black Mountain College to continue her exploration of the material.

In large part, Asawa’s use of wire drew Nakahira to Asawa’s story. In addition to its low cost, wire was relatively child-friendly, an important value to Asawa, who wanted to marry and have kids, six to be exact. Asawa would wed Albert Lanier, a former Black Mountain College classmate, in San Francisco in 1949, where their interracial marriage was legal and would be more accepted. Motherhood proved to complement, rather than hinder, Asawa’s artistic practice. As the young couple’s family expanded, Asawa’s wire work only grew in scale and complexity.

“I think a lot about how Ruth chose wire to work with, because wire is child friendly,” said Nakahira, after an observation made by Asawa’s close friend, the jeweler Merry Renk, who found that the materials she worked with were too toxic for young children. “Part of the genius of Asawa,” said Nakahira, “is that Ruth made that choice. While many other artists and art institutions during this time looked down on women artists with children, her strong valuing of family is so timely and meaningful. She lived life on her own terms, and that’s really empowering to me.”