The San Francisco-based Purple Moon Dance Project performed “When Dreams Are Interrupted” at the Japanese American National Museum’s Aratani Hall on June 23 during the APIA National Historic Preservation Forum.
Originally presented in San Francisco and Berkeley, the piece is adapted according to the area where it is being performed; for a Los Angeles audience, it depicted the uprooting of the Little Tokyo and Terminal Island communities. Appropriately, the backdrop was the old Nishi Hongwanji, now part of JANM, where Japanese Americans gathered to be taken to camp in 1942.
Above: Clinton Patterson on trumpet, dancers Sharon Sato and Jill Togawa (founder and artistic director of Purple Moon Dance Project). Below: Dancer Ruth Ichinaga holds name tags like those worn by internees.
(Photos by Marian Warren)