Ruth Asawa

This is Ruth Asawa, an important sculpture artist from California. Born in 1926 in Norwalk, California, Asawa was the fourth of seven children in her family. Her parents immigrated to America from Japan before she was born and worked as farmers.

However, when Ruth was just 16 years old, she and her family were forced into a internment camp. Internment camps were created during the 1940’s because people were scared that Japanese Americans would help Japan fight the United States during World War II. This fear was not founded on any evidence. The people were put into camps based only on their race, they had not done anything wrong. This was a hard time for Ruth but she overcame this adversity and moved forward. When asked about this time she said “ I hold no hostilities for what happened; I blame no one. Sometimes good comes through adversity. I would not be who I am today had it not been for the internment, and I like who I am.”

Ruth and her family were released from the internment camp in 1943, and after that she attended art school. At school, Asawa started making a series of crocheted wire sculptures in various abstract forms. She began with basket designs, and later explored biomorphic forms that hung from the ceiling.

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Biomorphic means that it resembles a living thing.

When she was done with school, Ruth then moved to San Francisco where she lived for the rest of her life. She created many public works of art which are displayed all over San Francisco and the world. She also help start a public high-school dedicated to the study of the arts which is now called the Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of Arts.

Today we will be creating our own biomorphic wire sculptures inspired by Ruth Asawa.