North Mixing Zone Artists
Lauren Iida
Lauren Iida was born in Seattle and holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Cornish College of the Arts (2014). She shares her time between Seattle and Cambodia, exhibiting her work, creating public art installations, and mentoring and representing emerging contemporary Cambodian artists through Open Studio Cambodia.
Her main medium is intricately hand-cut paper, often incorporating layers of ink washed paper and focusing on negative space and shadow play. Her reoccurring 30-foot-long hand-cut paper temporary installation/performance piece, the "Memory Net" has traveled the world, taking on new meaning and engaging communities in each new context.
Iida has exhibited her work at ArtXchange Gallery, King Street Station, the Mayor’s Gallery at Seattle City Hall, Shoreline City Hall, Virago Gallery, Tacoma Spaceworks, Sculpture Northwest, and Columbia City Gallery among others. Iida is an Artist Trust GAP Grant recipient and received an Art Matters fellowship in 2017. She was also awarded a Densho Artist-in-Residence Award in 2021. She is represented by Artxchange Gallery.
Her work has been collected by the City of Bellevue Portable Art Collection (2021), Washington State Arts Commission (2020), King County Public Art Collection (2019), and the City of Seattle Portable Works Collection (2016). Iida has been commissioned to create temporary and permanent public art by The City of Seattle, The City of Shoreline, Washington State Convention Center Addition, The Office of Arts and Culture/Seattle Department of Transportation, The City of Bellevue, Plymouth Housing, Sound Transit, the Denver Theatre District, and others. Iida belongs to the Washington State Arts Commission Public Art Roster (2021), City of Seattle Ethnic Artist Roster (2017), and the Sound Transit Artist Roster (2016).
Iida is the founder of Open Studio Cambodia, an arts collective based in Siem Reap, Cambodia which supports emerging Cambodian contemporary artists and organizes exhibitions, art workshops, and contemporary art tours throughout the country.
Much of Iida's artwork is influenced by Cambodia where she has been active for many years working on projects to support and mentor artists and other social entrepreneurship projects beginning in 2008. Other major influences include her family's Japanese American heritage and incarceration during WWII and celebrating her Pacific Northwest home.
Lawrence Matsuda
Lawrence Matsuda was born in the Minidoka, Idaho Concentration Camp during World War II. He and his family were among the approximately 120,000 Japanese Americans and Japanese held without due process for approximately three years or more. Matsuda has a Ph.D. in education from the University of Washington. He is a retired, teacher, counselor, principal, assistant superintendent, visiting professor and school design consultant. Currently he is a writer and educational consultant.
In July of 2010, his book of poetry entitled, A Cold Wind from Idaho was published by Black Lawrence Press in New York. In 2014, Glimpses of a Forever Foreigner was released. In 2015, Matsuda collaborated with artist, Matt Sasaki, and produced a graphic novel, Fighting for America: Nisei Soldiers. An American Hero-Shiro Kashino which is chapter one of the novel that was animated by the Seattle Channel. It won a 2016 regional Emmy. In 2016, he and Tess Gallagher collaborated on Boogie Woogie CrissCross, a book of poetry published by MadHat Press. In 2019 his novel based on his mother’s life, My Name is Not Viola, was published by Endicott and Hugh Books.
In 2023, his book Shapeshifter-Minidoka Concentration Camp Legacy won an Honorable Mention in the Idaho Book of the Year competition.
Akiko Sogabe
Akiko Sogabe creates artworks using kirie, a traditional Japanese technique in which images are constructed through intricate cuts of paper. She made her first paper cut art in middle school imitating a Chinese paper cut illustration in a newspaper. She continued to practice kirie on a daily basis as a hobby from middle school to adulthood and this eventually turned into a profession.
She was a technical assistant in the Human Genetics Department at the National Institute of Genetics in Japan and the University of Hawaii.
In 1978, she moved to the U.S. and introduced kirie to the Pacific Northwest. Her works are in the collections of corporations, organizations, and universities. Original kirie pieces can be found in the collections of Mitsubishi International Corporation, the State of Washington and Oregon Arts Commission Public Art, Fort Lewis of Washington, Overlake Hospital in Bellevue, and the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance and more.
Her works are displayed at more than 30 public schools from elementary through college in the State of Washington. Her public art is installed at the Pike Place Market (panels showing the history of Nikkei farmers) and Uwajimaya Village (Dragon Tower) in Seattle.
She’s also an award-winning children’s book illustrator.
She currently resides in Bellevue, Washington.