There are terrific artists and photographers in this state, and it’s a very friendly and supportive environment here – good energy at all levels, from college students to gallerists, curators and well-seasoned artists.

I shoot a lot of food for the editorial photography side of my life, and I think that artists and chefs are sharing the love of the local these days. If you lived in New York City, your art viewing and food sampling would be larger and more diverse. But one can live where they want to these days, and be both appreciated by their local audience, and also in touch with what’s happening elsewhere. The online photography world, which I’ve always found incredibly friendly, helps to connect us all.

Being a working editorial photographer you tend to travel often and far. I can only imagine the places that you have seen, the things you have experienced. What keeps you rooted in Wisconsin of all places?

Wisconsin will always be home to me – I was born and raised here and feel deeply connected. I’m lucky to be able to travel a lot, but my location near to Chicago (Milwaukee is just 90 minutes away) is really important for much of the editorial work I do. My partner Marilu (a sculpture park director) lives in St. Louis, so that makes for even more time away, but I always feel most at home in Wisconsin.

So much of your work explores the intersection of place and home as they exist in both the past and present. Why are you drawn to these themes?

It seems to me that people are either very interested in their roots and family history, or not at all. I just can’t seem to get enough of anything related to my ancestors and those who came before me, including my parents. I’m fascinated with the paths that my ancestors took and the events (on both personal and national/international levels) that changed my particular family history.

I grew up Asian American in a white, suburban Midwestern setting, so that may be a source for some of my interest. And while what I’m interested in is deeply personal to me and my family, we all share compelling stories of those who came before us – histories of emigration, migration or displacement, whether chosen or forced.

I copy a lot of old family photographs that belong to my relatives – one favorite is a photo postcard of an old Japanese steamer ship in a photo album that belonged to my maternal grandmother. There’s nothing written on the page, so there’s no way of knowing who was aboard that ship – possibly a friend, likely a relative. So it’s a bit mysterious, but very symbolic, and I love that photograph because so many others could find a similar picture in their old family albums – ships coming from Ireland or Sweden, or the Philippines. The similarities that exist in a land of immigrants, along with the amazingly diverse individual stories, is what this country unique and special. Now, more than ever, we should all remember that.

When it comes to this new body of work, Echo, I read much poetry in the conversation with your ancestry. Who do you imagine you are talking to?

I’ve never thought of it that way, and I love that you framed it in those terms. You know that hypothetical question, ‘If you could have dinner with anyone, who would it be?’ I think my answer would be my maternal great grandparents, who came to Hawaii from Japan in the late 1800’s, and my paternal grandparents, who arrived a bit later to the West Coast, and who lived through the effects of displacement and incarceration during WWll. They all lived through great change their lives, and I have so much respect for their fortitude.

In thinking about relatives I’ve never met, I the underlying question is what they were like as people – how they treated others, their sense of humor, their mannerisms. And then ultimately, which of those qualities, if any, where handed down to me?

By appropriating family photographs and artifacts are you ever concerned that in utilizing one narrative to satisfy another you may be dissolving the context in how these objects originally existed?

The work in Echo is a mix of old family photos and objects, along with photographs I’ve made in the past, or newly created for the series. All of the pictures that I’ve created, though often seemingly small moments, hold a great deal of meaning. So I think I’m quite protective and careful of how I juxtapose those older items with newer images. Connecting them all is family, bloodlines, and I’m trying to tell the story of my family in a new way. In one diptych, a photograph I made of my great grandmother’s brooches is paired with a photograph of my nephew’s hand, holding his agate collection. The pairings need to work visually, but there has to be underlying meaning for me, even if it’s not evident to the viewer.

Are you currently working on any Wisconsin based projects at the moment?

For the past few years, I’ve been making typological portraits of people against a black background. It started with a series of portraits of protestors at the state capital in Madison, and continued with a commission from the Haggerty Museum of Art, where I photographed people connected to Lake Michigan. In addition to the exhibition, that project (Perimeter) resulted in a book, and one day I hope to expand on that, by making portraits all over the state. I’d love to spend time traveling from one end of the state to the other, photographing everyday Wisconsinites.