My artwork addresses the loss of my Japanese heritage from my family’s intergenerational experiences in the United States. I can connect with my lost Japanese identity by pairing the remnants of my family’s past with more dominant American realities—such as the Japanese American internment camps of World War II—in my artwork. Multiple types of techniques, materials, and imagery are layered on to one of my collaged paintings. Certain layers are seamless, while others are dissonant. With both I seek to question what right I have to appropriate imagery from a history I was not present for, a culture I never experienced, and a family that is no longer here. The central family figure in any painting is consequently isolated in a fragmented and shifting landscape that now defines their identity.