"A Bridge for Peace"

Peace Show Introduction

 

The argument for a peaceful, safe, and habitable planet should have been easily won. Seemingly, such endowments are a through-line of all our desires. And yet, humanity often seems far from realizing the goal.

 

Forty-three years running, the Nagasaki Museum of Art and the artist Hideo Sakata, under the aegis of LELA International, has been quietly, serenely making the case for peace. On August 9th, 1945, Sakata, now a long-established Los Angeles artist, was a child playing in a family garden when the nuclear bomb ending WWII fell into his Nagasaki neighborhood.

 

The horror remains undeniable. And, regrettable, even among those who made the decision at the time to develop and use the weapon.

 

With brush and pen, stone chisel, and wood-saw, now film and video, serving as forms of expression, an aggregation of peace-driven artists from all walks of life, ages, ethnicities, genders, have returned to ground zero on the ninth day of August to reassert our solidarity with Sakata and the people of Nagasaki.

 

Moreover, we seek to commemorate the fallen, and celebrate tolerance and understanding among all people.

 

Sakata, soon-to-be eighty-eight years of age, painting in his Southern California garden at least four hours daily, will this year bring the “8.9 Peace Show” of LELA International to The Makery Gallery in the Downtown Los Angeles Arts District. Fittingly, the DTLA art community borders the vibrant and historically important Los Angeles neighborhood known as Little Tokyo.

 

Hideo Sakata and the directors of LELA hope you will join us in the promotion of memory and hope, and a quiet resolve to achieve peace.

 

William Hemmerdinger

Los Angeles, California 2023