Please join us as author, Holly Thompson, talks about her newest picture book titled, "Listening to Trees: George Nakashima, Woodworker," about the life and work of Japanese-American woodworker, George Nakashima. She will read excerpts from the book and discuss what inspired her to write about Nakashima, the writing/illustration process, as well as why she chose haibun to tell his story. 

We will also be joined by art curator, Asako Katsura,  who will speak on the hybridity of Nakashima's woodworking design by introducing examples of his furniture from the Museum of Fine Arts Boston's current collection. Learn how Nakashima reinterpreted modernist design by incorporating elements of both Japanese and American culture, and how his relationships with other artists, such as Antonin Raymond and Junzō Yoshimura, inspired him.

This is a free hour long presentation with Q&A hosted on Zoom. Registration is required. 

About The Book:

A poetic and moving picture book biography celebrating the life and work of the visionary Japanese American woodworker George Nakashima.

Growing up in the Pacific Northwest, George Nakashima began a love story with trees that grew throughout his remarkable life as an architect, designer and woodworker. During World War II, George, with his wife Marion and their baby daughter, endured incarceration in Minidoka prison camp, where he drew comfort from the discipline of woodworking. 

Once free, George dedicated the rest of his life to crafting elegant furniture from fallen or discarded trees, giving fresh purpose and dignity to the wood and promoting a more peaceful world. Today, his pieces are displayed in museums and greatly coveted by collectors. His studio, now helmed by his daughter Mira, is still active in New Hope, Pennsylvania.

Author Holly Thompson narrates Nakashima’s life using haibun, a combination of haiku and prose, which twines smoothly through Toshiki Nakamura’s earthy illustrations. A foreword by Mira Nakashima and robust back matter will deepen young readers' understanding of woodworking and poetry, and offer added insights to the work of a master artisan.

"Listening to Trees: George Nakashima, Woodworker" can be found on various sellers on the official publisher's page: Holiday House Website 

About the Speakers:

Holly Thompson (hatbooks.com) is the author of the picture books Listening to Trees: George Nakashima, Woodworker; The Wakame Gatherers; Twilight Chant; and One Wave at a Time, and the verse novels Falling into the Dragon's Mouth, The Language Inside, and Orchards winner of the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature. A graduate of the NYU Creative Writing Program, and a longtime resident of Japan, she writes and translates poetry, fiction and nonfiction for children, teens and adults, and teaches creative writing in Japan, the U.S., and places in between.

Asako Katsura is an Ishibashi Assistant Curator of Japanese Art at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston. She has been working on a wide range of research project on modern and contemporary Japanese art with emphasis on photography and, more broadly, on cross-cultural art practices and eclectic objects across the boundaries of nations and media from the 19th to 20th centuries. She completed her master’s degree at Sophia University in Tokyo with research project about the representation of Yosemite landscape by a painter Chiura Obata from the early 20th century. She earned doctorate at the Visual Studies Program, University of California, Irvine with a dissertation about the use of photography by conceptual artists in Japan and California in the 1960s and 1970s. She has previously worked as an intern of the Noguchi Museum in Long Island New York, and she has participated in several exhibition projects including Chiura Obata: American Modern at the Okayama Prefectural Museum and Our Ecology: Toward A Planetary Living at the Mori Museum in Tokyo.

Please note that we often take photographs at events for our records and sometimes for use in public media such as Facebook and blog posts. Registering for an event generally signifies acknowledgment that your likeness may be used in these ways. If you are not comfortable with this, please let us know and we can accommodate you.

As part of registering, we ask for your email address. Your email address will not be sold or given to third parties without your permission. By registering with your email address, you may receive emails from the Japan Society of Boston, including updates about event details , announcements about other upcoming events, and special offers.  Please be in touch with us anytime to change your email preferences.