Censorship and particularly the silencing of cultural expression is not confined to dictatorships. Whether in autocratic or democratic countries, cultural institutions and spaces have also waged attacks against art and creative expression.
This panel features artists Anida Yoeu Ali and Erin Shigaki in conversation with one another as they discuss institutional accountability to artistic censorship and erasure. The discussion is moderated by Ploi Pirapokin and highlights both artists’ histories with controversy as Asian American artists who have centered their histories and identities within their art practice. Ali and Shigaki will reflect on the ways in which power and authority have enacted racial trauma through cultural silencing that has deeply impacted their communities. Framing questions include: What is the state of art censorship today and its implications for artists, curators and the public at large? How can institutions authentically transform controversy into a learning moment that actively engages social change? Can cultural institutions regain the artist’s trust or that of their communities after racially traumatizing controversies?
Bellevue Arts Museum
Free
About the Panelists
Anida Yoeu Ali
Artist, educator and global agitator Anida Yoeu Ali is participating in the 2021 Bellwether Festival with her durational performance work addressing Islamophobia titled The Red Chador: Genesis I. The performance marks her return after a 3-year hiatus as a result of the 2017 enforced disappearance of her one-of-a-kind red sequin garment at Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv. No stranger to controversy, Ali’s artworks have agitated the White House (My Asian Americana, 2011 & Return to Sender, 2012), been attacked by anonymous vandals (1700% Project, 2010), and censored by both Vietnam’s culture police (Pushing Thru Borders, 2003) and The Smithsonian (The Red Chador, 2016). Most recently, Ali led a “successful” 2020 community campaign against The Artist Trust for their unethical dismissal of her jurying panel, to which she has paid a grave price for. Ali is actively engaged in international dialogues, community activism, and artistic resistance to multiple sites of oppression. Her artistic practice upholds her lifelong belief that art is a critical tool for individual and societal transformation.
Erin Shigaki
Erin Shigaki is a yonsei or fourth-generation Japanese American born and raised in Seattle, WA. She infuses untold community history and stories into murals and installations with a deep focus on racial and social justice, and healing. Her work about the Bellevue Japanese American community was first censored at Bellwether 2019, and then was literally white-washed by a Bellevue College administrator in 2020. Erin is the recipient of grants from the City of Seattle Office of Arts & Culture, 4Culture, Densho, the Wing Luke Museum, and the Kip Tokuda Memorial Washington Civil Liberties Public Education Grant, among others. She is also a community activist with the Minidoka Pilgrimage, Tsuru for Solidarity, and serves on the board of the TV program Look Listen + Learn. All of this work is fundamental to her artistic practice.
About the Moderator
Ploi Pirapokin
Ploi Pirapokin is the Nonfiction Editor at Newfound Journal, and the Co-Editor of The Greenest Gecko: An Anthology of New Asian Fantasy forthcoming from Wesleyan University Press. Her work is featured in Tor.com, Pleiades, Ninth Letter, Gulf Stream Magazine, The Offing, and more. She has received grants and fellowships from the San Francisco Arts Commission, the Creative Capacity Fund, Headlands Center for the Arts, Djerassi, Kundiman and others. A graduate of the Clarion Writers Workshop, she also holds an MFA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University. She currently teaches at the Writers Program at UCLA Extension, the Creative Nonfiction Foundation, Catapult, and the University of Hong Kong. She uses speculative fiction as a way to explore postcolonial poetics, imperialism in Asia, and Pan-Asianism, and writes essays meditating on immigration, race relations, and inter-generational traumas. She can be found on ppirapokin.com.
About Bellwether
Bellwether is a free multi-disciplinary arts experience produced by the City of Bellevue in collaboration with Bellevue’s arts community and with guidance from the city’s Arts Commission.
A bellwether is a sign of things to come. The name was chosen as a symbol of the overarching mission of the event: to showcase Bellevue’s creative future and to turn that future into reality.
Bellwether got its start as a biennial sculpture exhibition in 1992. Now in its 16th series, the event has evolved to encompass new forms of art and culture. Since 2018, Bellwether has been held every year to harness the city’s growth and support artists year-round.
