Art club collaborates on collage with its Japanese sister city

Members of the Sunnyvale Art Club each took a piece of Japanese culture to create panels for a collage, not knowing what the completed artwork would look like until their panels came together with those created by Japanese artists.

The resulting collage is a multimedia representation of a cultural asset located in Iizuka, Japan, which is Sunnyvale's Sister City. To create the 28 panels, the artists used sections of a photo of the ITO Denemon House, which was the main residence of coal mining merchant Ito Denemon and his wife Yanagiwara Byakurende. The house has been designated a National Important Cultural Asset and can be toured.

“This collage is the first collaboration between the Sunnyvale Art Club and the Iizuka Art Association,” Andrea Catura, the art club member who organized the effort, said in a statement. “The idea was developed during the COVID-19 pandemic, when artists could not gather in person.”

The collage was unveiled earlier this month. Mayor Larry Klein said it will most likely hang in Sunnyvale's new city hall.

Contributing artists from the Sunnyvale Art Club are Catura, Shuchi Maheshwari, Jayashree Sadasivan, Lailani Africa, Donna Miklica, Debby Pratt, Ishani Bhatt, Jenny Tang, Janelle Madison, Neela Shukla, Gezan D. Souza, Geeta Taneja, Mary Gow and Ishwarryah Ramanathan.

Contributing artists from the Iizuka Art Club are Shiori Tokura, Manabu Kurihara, Kenji Ejima, Seiji Mastuoka, Soi Cao, Katsumi Ohmura, Toshiki Harada, Shiori Tokura, Taigo Yasukawa, Sachiko Matsuda, Hisashi Muta, Hokan Sakamoto, Hiroo Noda and Tomona Kumamoto.