Between Art and Activism: Sculptor Ruth Asawa and Geometric Choreography with Dr. Jennie Hirsh

This seminar looks at the life and work of Japanese American sculptor and arts education advocate Ruth Asawa (1926-2013) whose enigmatic and elegant wire sculptures have attracted an increasing amount of widespread critical attention as well as mainstream recognition, having been featured on a series of U.S. postage stamps in 2020. At the same time, we will explore the much anticipated exhibition Ruth Asawa Through Line, which was co-organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City that will host it from September 2023 to January 2024 before traveling the show to the Menil Drawing Institute in Houston.

In this conversation, we will explore the evolution of Asawa's sculptural practice, retracing her educational training, first in the art education program at Milwaukee State Teachers College and then at the experimental Black Mountain College. Mentored by luminaries such as Joseph Albers, Buckminster Fuller, and Jacob Lawrence, there she discovered the impact of drawing and lines, as well as the potential of unexpected processes and materials, honing the methods and skills that would inform her inimitable works in paper, wire thread, and bronze. In this contextualized reading of her abstract as well as figurative sculptural work, we will explore her advocacy for and leadership within arts education as well.

Led by an expert on modern and contemporary art, Jennie Hirsh, this interactive seminar will provide an introduction as well to the complicated challenges that Asawa faced against the landscape of xenophobia and persecution toward Asian Americans at the time of World War II. Designed to inform curiosity as well as future travels, participants will come away with an increased enthusiasm for visiting works by Asawa as well as the growing number of exhibitions and collections celebrating her incredible legacy.

Image courtesy of The De Young Museum, Untitled (1955), Ruth Asawa