MICHIKO OLSON

I grew up in a Japanese village called Kameda which is outside of Niigata, a city on the Japan Sea coast. My family lived in an old farm house. Each room was enclosed by white rice paper shoji screens. The white square images that appear on my picture are meant to represent an image of these shoji screens. As a child, I loved to catch insects, cicadas and grasshoppers in the summer and bright red dragonflies in fall. I also loved to draw and paint. I drew the insects that I caught, and I made comic books with my friends. Sometimes after dinner, my parents cut flowers from the yard, and we all sat together and drew them.

After college, I became a school teacher. After that, I taught Japanese, and I also taught cooking. But I never tried to pursue a career in art, which was what I was most passionate about. I was always intimidated by how difficult it is to break into the art field. When I married a nice American man and moved from Tokyo to New York for my husband's job, I decided to take classes at Parsons School of Art in New York, a school with some great teachers. Some teachers made positive comments such as "Your line is very unique." or "You position things in an interesting way." I was encouraged. But I felt that these comments were not because of my talent but because I have a different cultural background. I must say that in the US I sometimes benefit from my different cultural background.

Shortly after I finished my course at Parsons School, we moved to Seattle for my husband's school. I contacted some artist's agents to try to sell my artwork. Their answer was "Unless you have some unique technique, we are not interested in seeing you." So I thought I should try creating some Japanese art.

I grew up surrounded by many antique Japanese paintings and calligraphy in my parent's house, and I loved them. I chose to make kirie because I think that it captures the essence of Japanese art, and I love Japanese paper.

I read some books about kirie; created some artwork; and sent my artwork to an annual national kirie contest in Japan. To my surprise, my picture was selected as one of the winners, and it was sent on a one year tour throughout Japan.

We wanted to settle on Bainbridge Island after my husband's school was finished, but we had to move back to Tokyo and then to New York again for his job. This time I decided to study Japanese painting. Our family eventually grew to three children, and after a very busy 8 years in New York, my husband and I decided to move back to the Northwest. We took our children out of school for a year and took a long, slow road West, traveling around the national parks and other sites in the western US and also Japan before settling on Bainbridge Island.

One day I went to the Bainbridge Island library with my children and happened to find a children's picture book that was created by my former classmate at Parsons School. She was working on this book while we were in class together. This was an inspiration for me. I told my children that if I never try to do something with my art, I will have regrets, so I'm going to focus on my artwork. They said "yeah, Mom." A few days later, I saw an advertisement seeking art for Bainbridge in Bloom, so I decided to give it a shot. I was surprised, happy and encouraged when my artwork was selected.

There are many aspects of the Bainbridge Island community that make us feel at home here. One aspect is the Japanese American community. I was unaware of the Japanese American experience during World War II until I moved here. Both of my grandfathers had similar experiences during the war in Japan. They were both opposed to the war and were active in antiwar efforts. Consequently the Japanese government sought to stop them and imprisoned one of my grandfathers until the war was over.

One day my son told me "you know, I'm proud of American culture when I'm in Japan, and I'm proud of Japanese culture when I'm in America." This is true to me, too. The exchange of culture between Japan and America has enriched my life and helped me better appreciate both cultures.