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Yuri Kochiyama

Yuri Kochiyama
Usage Conditions Apply
Artist
Corky Lee, 5 Sep 1947 - 27 Jan 2021
Sitter
Yuri Kochiyama, 21 May 1921 - 1 Jun 2014
Date
1980 (printed 2016)
Type
Photograph
Medium
Gelatin silver print
Dimensions
Image: 23.4 × 15.5 cm (9 3/16 × 6 1/8")
Sheet: 25.4 × 20.4 cm (10 × 8 1/16")
Topic
Costume\Headgear\Hat
Costume\Dress Accessory\Eyeglasses
Architecture\Building
Exterior\Cityscape
Equipment\Sign
Yuri Kochiyama: Female
Yuri Kochiyama: Society and Social Change\Reformer\Activist\Civil rights activist
Portrait
Place
United States\New York\Kings\New York
Credit Line
National Portrait Gallery; Smithsonian Institution
Restrictions & Rights
Usage conditions apply
Copyright
© Corky Lee Estate
Object number
NPG.2016.102
Exhibition Label
Yuri Kochiyama 1921–2014
Born San Pedro, California
Yuri Kochiyama was a natural community organizer, even under duress. When she was imprisoned with other Japanese Americans in an internment camp in Jerome, Arkansas, she initiated an effort to write letters to Nisei soldiers fighting in the European and Pacific theaters. After the war, she and her husband moved to New York City, where they joined with African American and Puerto Rican groups to demand equal access to education and jobs. After Kochiyama met Malcolm X in 1963, her activism radicalized. This photograph documents Kochiyama’s participation in a restaurant workers protest organized by the Chinese Staff and Workers Association in New York City’s Chinatown.
Born Mary Yuriko Nakahara, she began calling herself Yuri in the late 1960s to identify with her Japanese ancestry, much like black activists who took African or Muslim names. Present when Malcolm X was assassinated in 1965, Kochiyama bravely rushed to his side.
Corky Lee (born 1948)
Gelatin silver print, 1980 (printed 2016)
NPG.2016.102
Data Source
National Portrait Gallery
Location
Currently not on view