In the Future We Call Now: Realities of Racism, Forging Democracy

JANM's new core exhibition, In the Future We Call Now: Realities of Racism, Forging Democracy, will reimagine how it tells the stories of Japanese Americans by drawing on today's technological advances and national discussion around race and democracy; include familiar elements to carry the World War II incarceration stories forward; and highlight new stories that explore the choices that the Japanese American community made in face of adversity as they fought towards an ever-shifting vision of the future. The exhibition draws on JANM's extensive collection, the largest collection of Japanese American history and material culture in the world, to explore 160 years of Japanese American history. Prewar galleries will include clothing and tools from workers on plantations in Hawai'i, historical artifacts and photographs from growing Japantown communities on the continental US, and compelling prewar home movies that convey the vibrance of the Japanese American community interrupted by unjust incarceration. Well-known objects such as the newly restored Heart Mountain barracks, artist Kristine Aono's glass box piece Relics from Camp: An Artist's Installation, and Lance Matsushita's model of the Manzanar concentration camp will return in the immersive World War II galleries. Among the new stories explored will be experiences from Tule Lake Segregation Center, where the US government imprisoned Japanese Americans who were deemed "disloyal." Multimedia installations will continue the timeline from postwar resettlement through the Asian American movement and redress. The exhibition brings the Japanese American story into the present, exploring its influence on popular culture from rice cookers to import cars to Hello Kitty and the community's response to anti-Muslim sentiment following the attacks on 9/11, recent anti-Asian hate, and today's attacks on immigrant communities.