Tokio Ueyama Explained

Tokio Ueyama
Birth Date:1889
Birth Place:Wakayama, Japan
Death Date:1954
Occupation:Artist

Tokio Ueyama (1889–1954) was a Japanese-born painter best known for his landscapes, still lifes, and portraits. He was born in 1889 in Wakayama, Japan,[1] and immigrated to the United States in 1908 when he was 18 years old. He went on to study fine art at the University of Southern California and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. He later settled in Los Angeles, California.

Following the bombing of Pearl Harbor, he was incarcerated with his wife Suye at the Granada Relocation Center (today's Amache National Historic Site) in southeast Colorado. While there, he taught adult art classes.[2] When they returned to Los Angeles in the summer of 1945, they opened a gift shop called Bunkado, which continues to operate in Little Tokyo.[3]

Ueyama died in 1954. His work is in the collections of the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles, California.[4] His papers are in the Archives of American Art in Washington, DC.[5]

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Tokio Ueyama . 2024-06-17 . Bunkado . en.
  2. Web site: Tokio Ueyama Denver Art Museum . 2024-06-17 . www.denverartmuseum.org.
  3. News: Pearson . Bradford . 2020-07-01 . After Internment, a Store Was Born. It's Still an L.A. Staple. . 2024-06-17 . The New York Times . en-US . 0362-4331.
  4. Web site: 2023-09-14 . JANM Lends Artworks for Exhibition in Wakayama, Japan JANM Lends Artworks for Exhibition in Wakayama, Japan - FIRST & CENTRAL: The JANM Blog . 2024-06-17 . en-US.
  5. Web site: Series 1 A Finding Aid to the Tokio Ueyama papers, 1908-circa 1954, bulk 1914-1945 Digitized Collection Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution . 2024-06-17 . www.aaa.si.edu . en.