Artist as Archivist

Join us for an insightful conversation about art, folklore, community memory, family history and archives with Kioto Aoki, JI Yang, and Ayako Yoshimura. Together, they will discuss how artists and scholars approach archives, family history, and tradition.

Kioto Aoki is a Japanese American artist, educator, and musician whose work spans photography, film, sound, and performance. Her practice is grounded in the material and conceptual exploration of visual and temporal perception, often shaped by her background in traditional Japanese musical forms. Aoki’s projects have been exhibited and performed at venues including the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, The Art Institute of Chicago, Hyde Park Art Center, and Tokyo Photographic Art Museum. She is also a faculty member at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and leads Tsukasa Taiko.

JI Yang is the Associate Executive Director of the Heritage Museum of Asian Art, where he leads curatorial projects, community engagement, and initiatives that connect heritage, contemporary practice, and cultural preservation.

Ayako Yoshimura is a folklorist whose expertise touches upon autoethnography, family folklore, material culture, material behavior and communication, dress and identity, and the history of the kimono. She earned a PhD in folklore at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and has worked in various archives and libraries that preserve folk, communal, and regional traditions. She also offers consultation services and public talks on various aspects of Japanese folklore, such as food, kimonos, and the supernatural.