Kenji Shoemaker
Hold Please

In addition to the shared crane and mask display done in collaboration with Abbee Warmboe, this separate window is to shine a light specifically on the hardships facing the live event communities both locally and nationwide.

When the pandemic struck in March, my four in-progress performances ground to a halt. A similar occurrence happened to many, if not most, other live event workers who relied on the gathering of people as a source of income. Each crane in this display represents 1,000 unemployed live event workers reported by the Department of Labor in August of this year.  While our shows are currently postponed, or cancelled indefinitely, their scripts and notes may now get a bit of a second life folded into the cranes in this display in front of you.

MOre to know:

Learn more about the red lights in the window available on Kare 11: Red Alert Minneapolis: How the pandemic is affecting entertainment in the Twin Cities

Photos from the Twin Cities Red Alert event: 

Complete collection of photos available on Google drive here.

Artistic Response from Anna Hashizume

Exploring the many ways collaborations occur and listening to the vital voices of our artists, the Jungle's SHINE A LIGHT pairs participating designers with area artists to create thoughtful responses to the installations. These audio commentaries will be available online throughout the event and add depth for the viewer's experience to help spark expansive conversation.

Transcript of Anna’s Artistic Response

Hi everyone. My name is Anna Hashizume, and I’m a Japanese-American singer-actor, voice teacher, and podcaster based here in the Twin Cities.

When Kenji and I got together to discuss his window design, my heart nearly skipped a beat when I saw all the paper cranes. Growing up I was lucky enough to visit my family in Japan quite frequently. My grandpa, or ojiisan, was a teacher for most of his adult life. When he was in his 60s, he suffered a stroke. When this happened, his students banded together to create a design of one thousand paper cranes, or senbazuru, for him. I have memories of asking my dad about it as a kid. I remember imagining my ojiisan’s students creating so many tiny cranes for him. Putting in so much careful precision. In Japan, senbazuru is said to grant happiness, luck, or recovery. My ojiisan lived a good 20 years after his first stroke.

There’s another practice in Japan called senninbari which means thousand person stitches. This originated in the 1880s during the first Sino-Japanese War and continued during WWII. When soldiers went off to fight, the community would come together, and each person would contribute one piece of thread. These threads would be stitched together to make a handkerchief that soldiers carried around with them. The handkerchiefs were said to promote courage, good luck, and immunity from injury. In both of these instances we see communities coming together to help one another. We see people devoting time and energy to a common cause.

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about the concept of individualism vs. collectivism. In order for us to heal - as a community, as a state, as a nation - we need to come together. We need to lift each other up, care about one another, look out for our most vulnerable. That doesn’t come from the efforts of one person. That comes from the efforts of a community. The practices of senbazuru or senninbari are not about the number 1,000. That’s an arbitrary number. One thousand represents people coming together to help others.

The masks and cranes you see in this display were made by costumers, actors, and students. This display was a community effort. The paper cranes you see in the far left window were created out of scripts from jobs Kenji lost due to the pandemic. As for the number of cranes - one crane represents one thousand live events or arts workers who are currently unemployed. It’s a sobering image.

Like the practices of senbazuru and senninbari, the creation of theatre is a community effort. It literally takes a village to put on a piece of theatre, and it’s not just about the people onstage and backstage; it’s also about the audience. We are all in it together - creating this world and believing in the world that’s created.

In theatre, we have a phrase “no small parts, only small actors.” This means that regardless of how many lines or scenes you have, you’re still an important part of the production. Without each and every person giving their all every night, the show is not successful. We must keep this in mind as we move about the world. How can we contribute? How can we help create a better society?

It’s the efforts of a community and unity, not divisiveness, that will get us through our current moment. I hope we listen, act, and do our part - no matter how small it seems. In the moments when we feel the most hopeless, we will continue to lift each other up and keep moving forward together. In Japanese we say keizoku wa chikara nari “to continue is power.”