"HOPEFUL INTENTIONS" Project and Exhibition 2013

Tomodachi/Softbank/Ayusa YPLAN Leadership Program @ UC Berkeley
July 22- August 10 2013

It was another transformational teaching experience for me (year two) as one of the instructors of the
YPlan Leadership Program at UC Berkeley for 100 high school students who
came from the Earthquake, Tsunami devastated region of Tohoku Japan as part of the
Tomodachi /Softbank/Ayusa Leadership Program.  (Press Coverage: KTVU and SF Chronicle-
see my class and students!)

Representing the theme of "Public Space", I had the privilege of teaching the Y PLAN leadership/planning methodology providing students the foundation for future action plans helping to rebuild and revitalize their communities back home.  The experience offered the opportunity for students to deepen their leadership skills motivating them to become agents of change at home. The discussions around "place memory" and the need for honoring personal and collective memories in planning of public spaces were profound and resonated most with my students especially as many of them lost homes, friends and family.

My "Public Space " Yellow Team Students

Human Web "Community of Practice" Exercise
Teaching the value of everyone's contribution,
strengths and involvement to community 

Similar to last year,  I was able to incorporate an element of art as a symbolic representation of the student's "hopeful intentions".  Thank you Deb and David! With the help of the Y Plan Teaching Team  (Thank you Junko, Natsumi, Carol, Jessie, Chikara and Shirl) students wrote their action plans, hopes and dreams on strips of various repurposed paper (representing the rebirth of materials often discarded). They were made into bows I designed for installation and later given to the students to bring back home. It was intended as a visual memory of their experience, reminder and source of symbolic inspiration for actualizing their vision back home.

Student Action Plans, Dreams, Hopes  on Bows 

Hopeful Intentions Installation (Wall A) 

Hopeful Intentions Installation (Wall B) 

Special THANK YOU to mentor Stephanie Lam for
your dedicated help and the creative installation work! 

Emotional Good Byes...
Student Leader Taiki Handa

Notes from my Students

THANK YOU so much for inspiring ME! 

Enjoyed our time together! 

******

LEAVING MESSAGES AT Ferryland, Oakland

Another opportunity to team up with designer, educator, urban planner Shirl Buss to incorporate a creative element to the students' service project visit to Ferry Land. Inspired by the Sendai Tanabata Festival in Japan, we cut strips of colorful paper and students left messages to the children visiting Ferryland.  Loved the process of working with the students who took seriously the mission of leaving something of value behind.   Read more about the story in the OAKLAND LOCAL

Great working with you again Shirl! 

Graduation

"Move Slowly and Mend Things.."

The validation for my love of repurposing, wrapping, packaging and things hand made was validated at my daughter's High School Graduation Commencement. 

A speech made by Lick Wilmerding High School instructor Rebecca Hong asked us all to pause and reflect often, sharing a message to "Move slowly and mend things...(the antithesis of the Facebook motto of "move fast and break things") because as she pointed out" there is much in the world that is worth noticing, worth keeping and worth fixing". She asked everyone to consider our individual and collective impact on others and to act in ways that are to the best of our ability intentional and good.  She associated leading a meaningful and fulfilling life to embracing the difficult- yes, the difficulty that comes with worthwhile pursuits, the difficulty of slowing down and caring deeply and the difficulty of commitment. Equally she wished upon the seniors the pleasures of the difficult- the sense of purpose and the sense of connectedness that comes with doing the right things.  She concluded, "it's the difficult things that require you to move slowly and more deliberately but its the difficulties that will keep you from sleepwalking through your lives."

While I'm certain gift wrapping and packaging or even repurposing materials was not on her mind when sharing her profound thoughts, it spoke to me about why I treasure the art of using our hands and heart to "wrap" an intention, a thought, a sense of gratefulness that needs expressing and why even the careful selection of materials matter. It's a time consuming gesture when time is so limited but a worthwhile process that initiates intentional reflection. It allows our consciousness a moment to think of what we are doing and for who and for what purpose.  It requires you to "move slowly".

In celebrating this special moment in my daughter's life,  I'm grateful for the message shared by Rebecca Hong as it conveys what I too value. To my daughter Maddie who is our peacemaker -- Take the time to reflect always and appreciate your impact on others. "Move slowly and mend things" along the way.  There is importance, energy and significance to the thoughts and intentions behind one's actions and like gift wrapping, HOW we do things shares equal importance to WHAT we do or give.

LOVE YOU MADDIE and CONGRATULATIONS!

GRADUATION LEI for Maddie
Made Slowly with LOVE
 MOM

Asian Art Museum: Craft Warriors

Thursday APRIL 18, 2013  (5:00pm-9:00pm) 

Join me for an evening of crafting at the Asian Art Museum as I team up with a group of talented artists Emiko Oye, Ealish Wilson, Kathryn Kenworth to teach various techniques in our respective specialties to create armors and jewelry inspired by the popular Terra Cotta Warriors Exhibit!
Come see how discarded and repurposed materials can be transformed to fashion armors and other
artifacts mirroring the vision of the first Emperor of China himself!

It'll be a fun workshop evening of serious crafting, drinks, music, photo booth and inspired
creations.  Click here to RSVP and for more information:  Craft Warriors 

Asian Art Museum
April 18, 2013
5-9pm

by Megumi
inspired by Ealish Wilson 

American Craft Council: Library Card Project

Received word that my Library Card Project was featured on the American Craft Council
Website!  Hats off to American Craft Council Librarian Jessica Shaykett and Elizabeth Ryan Interactive Media Specialist for instigating this project and for their dedicated work in bringing it to life --igniting dialogue about the role of libraries, reuse and also for inspiring creativity in artists/makers. LOVE this project~

Read more about this project
INTERVIEW 

American Craft Council: Library Card Project
Gift Packaging: Tribute to Librariesby Megumi 

Library Card Inspired Dress
by Jewelry Designer and Wearable Art Maker Vanessa Waliko

LOVE IT!!  

Tribute to Old Library Cards

Being at the library for me was a sanctuary, a place not only to get your books and explore other
worlds but also a quiet place to escape.  It's the place where many creative ideas were incubated.
Only now in its absence I miss so much the card catalogs-beautifully typed, organized and displayed.  Much work and thought went into this filing system. I feel somehow a whole world having disappeared. If one could only imagine the excitement- as if I won the lottery- when I was volunteering for a school art auction project with my friend and the teacher asked if I would like to have a box of old library cards in the basement about to be tossed out. (THANK YOU Mr. Galvin! ) It was a treasure box for me.  It was meant to be in my hands to be restored, redistributed or otherwise just appreciated.  I gave them out to friends, donated a boxful to my favorite reuse center in San Francisco. Over the holidays I made little artpieces out of the old cards to put on gift boxes with high hopes they would be saved and generate the kind of emotion and nostalgia they did for me.
Here's to memories of the good old days...

Sharing my nostalgic "winning" of old library cards  with friends and
Scrap (reuse center for artists) in San Francisco 

My 2012 Holiday Tribute to the Library Card Catalog 

Japanese New Year Tradition (2013)

Happy New Year 2013!  New Years morning is something I look forward to every year. As far back as I can remember, it's been a tradition growing up celebrating the New Year (Oshogatsu in Japanese) with symbolic foods- ozoni soup (rice cake in fish broth with vegetables); kuri kinton (mashed sweet potatoes with chestnut) symbolizing gold, wealth, prosperity;  kuromame- sweet black soybeans for hard, industrious work and good health; and namasu- seasoned carrot and daikon signifying a strong foundation for family.  My mother passed away years ago but this tradition lives on through my mother in law Kyoko who is a wonderful cook.  While I've made some of the dishes in the past,  this year we cooked everything together and I am officially certified to take this on hereafter and pass it on to my children. I learned all of the dishes from the very best teacher. It's incredible to learn just how much work and hours goes into every detail.   Like gift wrapping, thought behind presentation is of value as the feelings behind the meal is expressed visually.  One of the many traditional influences passed down through the generations...

My family's  Japanese New Year Table
2013 

Memories of my Mother who brought lacquerware from Japan
that we use every New Year

My children receive "otoshidama" money envelope from their grandparents -
a Japanese New Years custom 

Making Mochi (Japanese rice cake) with my daughter
Melanie and Grandmother Kyoko 

The Gift of Handmade Inspiration

Celebrating the last days of 2012 December with a cold.  Wrapped in a blanket with some tea, I'm going through the trailers of the creative artist instructors on CreativeBug.  Their stories reveal the soul behind the craft works of the "makers" and so beautifully shot that it's not only a visual treat but like a good book, it brings you into another world, a new way way of seeing things, inviting you to take a journey into the magical world of handmade creativity.  I invite everyone to treat themselves and explore taking up a new craft in 2013-- learn to knit, sew, embroider or book bind as I plan to do.
Start with the free classes being offered for a limited time on Creativebug.com to get started.  Just a sampling.... I have a free class going on as well.

Paste Paper with Courtney Cerruti
http://www.creativebug.com/instructors/courtney-cerruti

Luminaria Candle Shades with Kelly Wilkinson
http://www.creativebug.com/instructors/kelly-wilkinson-5

Repurposed Bow with Megumi Inouye
http://www.creativebug.com/instructors/megumi-inouye

Embroidery Sampler with Rebecca Ringquist
http://www.creativebug.com/instructors/rebecca-ringquist