SOGIOKA, GENE ISAO (1914-1988)

Gene I. Sogioka, 73; Painted Camp Scenes

Published: March 01, 1988

     Gene Isao Sogioka, a watercolorist who painted scenes of daily life in an Arizona internment camp (Poston camp 2)  where he and other Americans of Japanese descent were held during World War II, died of cancer of the larynx on Febuary 21, 1988  at his home in Larchmont, N.Y. He was 73 years old.
     Mr. Sogioka, who was born in Irvindale, California, was a graduate of the Chiounard Art Institute, now the California Institute of Fine Arts. Before the war, he was an animator for the Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, California.
     In 1942, Mr. Sogioka and his family were sent to a camp near Parker, Arizona, one of several places where 120,000 Japanese-Americans, most of them from the West Coast, were interned. During the two years he spent in detention, he produced more than 150 watercolors depicting life in the camps.
     The paintings are now part of the archives at the Olin Library at Cornell University. Some of those paintings are currently at the Smithsonian Institution as part of its exhibition, ''A More Perfect Union: Japanese-Americans and the U.S. Constitution.''
     Mr. Sogioka is survived by his wife, the former Mine Mayebo; his brother, Mutushi, of Los Angeles; three daughters, Cecile Ralph of Gardiner, N.Y., Jean Sammarco of Townsville, Australia, and Alyce Conklin of New Paltz, N.Y., and three grandchildren.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/1988/03/01/obituaries/gene-i-sogioka-73-painted-camp-scenes.html