Case Study
Lynne Yamamoto: Supreme
By Aaron Landsman, December, 2002

"I work alone a lot," says New York visual artist Lynne Yamamoto, "and Creative Capital's support, including the non-monetary support, has been a very important affirmation of what I do." Creative Capital funded Lynne's installation Supreme in 2001; in addition, Strategic Financial Support helped her expand the scope of Supreme and her work in general. Lynn also attended the 2001 and 2002 retreats and is currently working with Colleen Keegan on strategic planning. Long recognized by critics for a series of works that deal with her grandmother's life as a Japanese immigrant to World War II era Hawaii, Lynne is a mid-career artist poised to take her work to a significantly higher level of exposure.

Supreme is a three-part installation that deals with the impact of World War II on Japanese society, politics, and culture. The first section in the work was shown at New York's P.P.O.W. Gallery in November of 2001, and the complete installation will be featured at the Munson Williams Proctor Institute in Utica, New York in March 2003. Described by Lynne as "an ambivalent memorial," Supreme weaves images of human loss into a larger framework of cultural significance; the work also uses common materials such as bell jars to question the notion of historical accuracy. The first section of Supreme featured a wall covered with cherry blossoms…each with the face of a dead Japanese soldier at its center…along with other elements linked to Japanese militarism and the country's role in the war.

One of the qualities that distinguishes Lynne's work is its painstaking attention to detail, which has made it difficult to extend the life of her exhibitions beyond their initial showings. From the start, Creative Capital helped Lynne broaden the reach of Supreme in several ways. In preparation for last year's P.P.O.W. exhibit, the staff strategized with Lynne on ways to create more than 9,000 tiny flower pieces for the work in just four weeks. After the exhibition, Lynne received a $5,000 Strategic Support award, which she used to buy a Macintosh G4 computer, scanner, and additional equipment. With this equipment, Lynne is creating a publication to accompany the visual installations in Supreme.

Lynne says that exposure to fellow grantee Dread Scott's publicity materials, a published booklet he presented at the 2001 retreat in lieu of slides, inspired her to take her own printed materials further. She describes the publication she is creating for Supreme as "another kind of exhibition strategy. A way to use materials that might be too didactic for the exhibition itself." It is also helping her consider ways to broaden the scope of her artwork as a whole. "Before I got the grant," Lynne says, "I hadn't done anything ambitious in video, and now I'm taking both editing and design classes."

Lynne points to the retreats as "extremely important. I felt part of an inspiring community. I came back and went to work with renewed fervor." In 2001, Lynne met with gallerist Christian Haye of The Project, fundraising consultant Nancy Scerbo Berlinger, and Valerie Cassel of the Houston Museum of Contemporary Art. In 2002, she met with Donna De Salvo, senior curator at the Tate Modern; Thomas Cleary, a financial consultant; and Julie Lazar, executive director of the International Contemporary Arts Network. She says Lazar was "very helpful in giving me names of people to send slides to." At the retreats, Lynn also connected with several artists with whom she maintains ongoing contact, including Dread Scott, Fred Holland, and Jeanette Louie.

Since receiving Creative Capital funding, Lynne was awarded a working residency at the Mattress Factory in Pittsburgh, and has been nominated for several prestigious awards and grants. She has also begun meeting with consultant Colleen Keegan to discuss long-range career strategies, through which she hopes to parlay her increasing recognition to a more stable career…a platform from which to continue creating her ambitious, earnest, and intricate work.