Kenji Liu is a multi-hyphenate artist and the author of Monsters I Have Been (Alice James Books, 2019), Craters: A Field Guide (Goodmorning Menagerie, 2017), and Map on an Onion (Inlandia Books, 2016). Publisher Ashaki M. Jackson conducted the interview.
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Ashaki M. Jackson: I think of the fairly recent inclusion of land acknowledgments during conferences. There is a zeitgeist of naming the communities that lived on, cultivated, and either moved or were dispossessed from the land through colonization. Opinions are divided on who land acknowledgments are for and if they are effective. This action is intended to honor those communities, to orient us, and — for some — to speak aloud the reach of colonization. If the Decolonized Area Rapid Transit (DART) stops were real, then the synthesized voices of George or Gracie might say, “Yuri Kuchiyama in 8 minutes.” What was your intention behind creating this visual that renames physical sites?
Kenji Liu: Land acknowledgements are interesting. Much like multiculturalism, it allows institutions and individuals to “include” while also believing their responsibility for unequal systems of power ends there. In this sense the DART map does nothing more than acknowledge. However, the original thought was a critique of the ways colonizers and the wealthy get places named after them, which then forces the rest of us to live in that map, a map that circumscribes everyday reality and possibility.
This was sparked at the time by the Occupy movement, which was very much about taking up physical space in places of power, and demanding corporate and government accountability. In Oakland, where I lived during the movement, the QTBIPOC caucus critiqued the settler-colonial language of “occupy” and the race and gender privilege within Occupy Oakland’s organizing structures. In solidarity with the Ohlone people, centuries of struggle against colonization and racism, and Oakland’s long history of QTBIPOC organizing, this caucus came to rename themselves as Decolonize Oakland.
It was in this context that the idea for the DART map came about.
AJ: I saw this project over ten years ago on Facebook, after it was complete. There was healthy excitement about the re-envisioning of BART stops that was heightened in part by the community engagement. (Did a government agency also install a DART poster in their office?) What spurred your call for the community to participate in the renaming?
KL: When I came up with the idea, I knew that it wasn’t up to one person to rename every stop. That’s the kind of thing that got us wealthy colonizers’ names on public spaces to begin with. I also knew the limits of my knowledge, that others would be able to suggest names I wouldn’t have been able to think of. In the spirit of Decolonize Oakland, collective organizing and resistance, I asked on Facebook for suggestions, and got a lot back.
No government agency ever installed DART, but CompassPoint Nonprofit Services installed a large DART in their office, and the Oakland Museum of California has one in their collection. BART did have a contractor send me a copyright infringement email threatening legal action if I didn’t stop selling posters and t-shirts with the map. I’d argue the map falls under [the legal First Amendment protections for] artistic license and satire, but I didn’t feel up to arguing at the time. I’m sure they counted on that.
One idea I never got to implement was to print stickers so that people could put them on actual maps at BART stops and inside the trains.
AJ: Are there any names you think were missing from the project?
KL: I don’t know of any names I’d add in hindsight, but I thought it was very interesting that while heroes such as Malcolm X and Huey Newton ended up on the map, nobody suggested Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., which, given the grassroots political history of the Bay Area, makes sense to me.
AJ: The map makes me think of how enslaved Black Americans chose new names after Emancipation — what it might have felt like to gift oneself a name and see that name on paper compared to the name you were given by your owners. What, if anything, did you learn about naming, ownership, and belonging during this project?
KL: I learned that seeing an instrument of power — an official map that commuters see everyday in this case — renamed is a powerful thing. Even if acknowledgement is just an initial step that does little to change power relations, the power of creativity is to change our imagination of a thing, and therefore imagine that further steps could be possible.
AJ: In addition to being a digital artist, you are also a traditional artist and poet. Where you gathered materials for your fiber art works and the foci of your painted urban landscapes study place and how you interact with the place. To what extent did your work on the DART map inform your exploration of place in the full range of your art?
KL: Place has been a crucial point of departure in my art for a long time, because community activism and advocacy has taught me that without place, you are adrift. The communities I have worked in the most have been based in specific neighborhoods that have had to be resilient over and over in the face of racism and capitalism. Personally, as someone who grew up without a strong connection to place, [understanding place] has been a process of learning how to stay.
AJ: I appreciate the idea that your art provides a type of mooring. I think there has been a shift in our sense of home and sense of safety in the last five years or so. Things feel unstable and out of our hands. What role have you seen art serve in the recent past regarding place?
KL: Something I really appreciate lately is ecological art, which often has a time-based, location-based element. During the pandemic, I spent long periods outdoors in a local wilderness park, exploring and learning about plants there. I began making very small works using only what I found. For example, I collected ripe, red peppercorns from California pepper trees, and filled crevices in the bark of horizontal branches to make interesting, bright shapes. I collected black walnut shells and arranged them in spirals. I collected inflorescence and made straight lines across hiking paths. It was my attempt to create art, but also an invitation. I wanted others to see what I did and interact with it. And over time, I knew weather and animals would change and scatter it. This was my way into also learning about the histories and uses of local plants, especially in making dyes and inks. This not only gave me a new way to explore creativity, but also soothed my nervous system, and connected me to Los Angeles as an ecosystem rather than just a city.
AJ: You also designed the covers for two of your collections — MAP OF AN ONION (Inlandia Books, 2016) and CRATERS: A FIELD GUIDE (Goodmorning Menagerie, 2017). I would guess that most writers do not have the wherewithal to write a manuscript and design the packaging in which those words reach the reader. What does design add to your creativity process?
KL: I hate seeing a good poetry book ruined by bad design. The book as an object has to be a joy to hold and page through. The relative ease now with which books can be printed en masse, and the online templates that print-on-demand services offer, means that anyone can do it, but that doesn’t mean it will look good. Bad design is a barrier to getting the book into more hands.
AJ: Yes, an art object! I think of Jonathan Safran Foer’s TREE OF CODES, a book that’s an erasure of Bruno Schulz’ STREET OF CROCODILES. A book of holes. I also think of Salvador Plascencia’s THE PEOPLE OF PAPER with its column-specific voices. These feel like little treasures in the way that the reader has to intentionally navigate the physical pages and the story. What is that book for you — the most interestingly or memorably designed book?
KL: I love books that are also physical pieces of art, like Tree of Codes. Unfortunately it can often mean they are more expensive because they are limited edition and require unique production methods. Therefore I rarely ever buy them. On the other hand, I really enjoy one-of-a-kind handmade books that are made through more humble means such as recycled materials, photocopy, risograph, hand printing, and sewing. I also love books that play with form and question received Western notions of “bookness” such as Japanese accordion style or Aztec codex. I appreciate works that truly consider the book as a constructed form, and the willingness to think beyond the conventions.
AJ: Any interesting or inspiring art we should pay attention to in our current cultural and political moment? What smart work has caught your eye?
I am currently focused on painting and visual poetry and am exploring a wide variety of things. Portraiture and other figurative painting has really caught my attention, so I’ll just throw out a few names for people to look up: José Luis Ceña Ruiz, Jennifer Packer, Michael Armitage, and Shota Nakamura.
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