The life and art of Miki Hayakawa (1899-1953) were shaped by her immigrant experience, cultural challenges, and a deep passion for self-expression through painting. Born in Japan and raised in the United States, she defied societal expectations and carved a unique path as a pioneering artist in California’s modernist movement during the early twentieth century.
Her story of personal transformation, perseverance, and artistic innovation reflects the broader struggles and triumphs of Japanese Americans during a turbulent period in U.S. history. By exploring her identity and navigating complex social landscapes, Hayakawa developed a legacy that continues to inspire artists and art historians alike.
The factual information about Hayakawa's life and art used in this article relies largely on the original research of Dr. ShiPu Wang, one of very few scholars who have extensively studied Hayakawa’s art.1
Early Life: Immigration and Early Life in Alameda, California
Miki Hayakawa’s story began in Nemuro, a fishing port on the eastern tip of Hokkaido island in Japan. She was born on June 7, 1899, as the only child of Man and Chiyo Hayakawa. Her father Man immigrated to the U.S. in 1907. One year later, nine-year-old Miki and her mother followed him across the Pacific. The family settled in Alameda, California, a city near San Francisco that was rapidly becoming home to a large community of Japanese immigrants.
The exact reason for the family’s immigration remains unclear. Some speculate that Man came to the U.S. to become a minister, while others suggest he was a teacher. Regardless of the precise reason, the Hayakawa family joined a growing population of Japanese immigrants in the Bay Area. Like many Japanese immigrants, they sought better wages and job opportunities in a country that seemed to offer a more promising future. Most of these immigrants found work in agriculture or small businesses, making a living in a new and sometimes hostile land.
By the 1910s, a vibrant Japanese community had established itself in Alameda. They formed their own Japantown, complete with various businesses such as barbershops, bathhouses, hotels, restaurants, grocery stores, tofu shops, and repair services. Institutions like the Alameda Nihonjin-Kai (Japanese Association), founded in 1906, and religious centers like the Methodist Church and Alameda Buddhist Temple (established in 1903 and 1916, respectively), served as cultural hubs. By 1920, Alameda County had 5,221 residents of Japanese descent, according to the record of the National Park Service.
The 2023 exhibition at the Alameda Free Library, Overflowing with Hope: The Hidden History of Japanese Americans in Alameda, gives a sense of thriving Japanese American community and optimism among its residents for their future in the U.S. Hayakawa, raised in this flourishing Japanese American community, was exposed to a fusion of Japanese and American cultures.
Japanese American children, including Nisei (second-generation Japanese Americans), often felt connected to both their ethnic heritage and the larger American society. Both Methodist and Buddhist churches in Alameda ran after-school programs in Japanese language and culture for children who attended local public schools. Hayakawa, though not Nisei, arrived in the U.S. at a young enough age that she too experienced this duality. Her exposure to both Japanese values, reinforced through community institutions, and American cultural influences shaped her emerging identity.
A Life-Altering Decision: Marriage and Independence
The next significant record of Hayakawa’s life dates to 1917, when she was 18 years old. According to research by Dr. ShiPu Wang, Hayakawa married Kiyoshi Okuye, a Japanese farmer in Livingston, California. However, by 1919, the marriage appeared to have ended, with the farmer citing “desertion” on Hayakawa’s part in a local newspaper.
This brief episode in Hayakawa’s life can be seen as a possible reflection of the two conflicting forces within her: the traditional cultural expectations of her Japanese heritage and the growing sense of independence she developed as a young woman raised in the U.S. During this period, arranged marriages were common among Japanese families in America. Young women were generally expected to enter marriages orchestrated by their families to preserve cultural traditions in a new country.
However, Hayakawa’s choice to leave the marriage suggests a desire to forge her own path, even at the risk of challenging parental and cultural expectations. At a time when Japanese women were widely expected to fulfill the roles of dutiful wives and mothers, Hayakawa’s decision to abandon this traditional path and pursue her passion for art may be seen as a bold and courageous step. This choice arguably marked the beginning of her journey as an artist and as a woman intent on defining her own life on her terms.
The Artist Emerges: Life and Art in San Francisco
Hayakawa’s desire to pursue art became the driving force in the next chapter of her life. Despite her father’s objections—he wanted her to pursue more “important” and conventional endeavors, according to some sources—Hayakawa’s passion for painting only grew stronger. In 1922, she was awarded a scholarship to study at the California School of Arts and Crafts (CSAC) in Berkeley. This scholarship marked the beginning of a formal artistic education that would shape the rest of her life.
In 1923, Hayakawa enrolled at the prestigious California School of Fine Arts (CSFA) in San Francisco, one of the premier art institutions on the West Coast. She continued her studies there until 1926, during which time she honed her skills and developed her unique artistic voice. The CSFA in the 1920s was known for its progressive atmosphere and its commitment to modernist ideals. Students and faculty from diverse backgrounds contributed to a dynamic intellectual and artistic environment that nurtured creativity and experimentation.
Notable artists like painter Otis Oldfield, known for his role in the modern art movement in California, and sculptor Ralph Stackpole, a proponent of European modernism, were among the faculty at CSFA during Hayakawa’s tenure. Hayakawa also took classes from influential female artists such as Jenkins Macky and Gertrude Partington Albright. The school was an important incubator for innovative ideas in the arts, playing a crucial role in shaping the Bay Area art scene. The rigorous yet nurturing environment at CSFA and the personal connections she made there helped Hayakawa develop her unique artistic voice, as well as her entry into the thriving San Francisco art community. The progressive and inclusive nature of the school also likely provided Hayakawa with a sense of belonging that may have been harder to find elsewhere at the time.
Hayakawa’s early years as an art student were studded by significant achievements and recognition. She won an award at CSAC in 1920 and exhibited her work at the San Francisco Art Association’s (SFAA) annual exhibitions from 1924 to 1929 Such early success and accolades must have been a welcome source of validation for her decision to pursue art.
San Francisco in the 1920s and 1930s was a vibrant cultural hub, attracting artists, writers, and thinkers from diverse backgrounds. The city’s cosmopolitan nature provided fertile ground for creative exchange, and Hayakawa became deeply embedded in its artistic community. The Montgomery Block, or “Monkey Block,” located near Chinatown, was home to many artists and galleries including the influential Modern Gallery founded by Hayakawa’s close friend Yun Gee, as Wang’s research shows. The area was a center of artistic and intellectual activity, and it is likely that Hayakawa’s connections with fellow artists like Gee helped shape her evolving identity as an artist.
In 1929, Hayakawa held her first solo exhibition at Kinmon Gakuen (Golden Gate Institute), a cultural center for the Japanese American community in San Francisco. The exhibition, which featured more than 150 of her works, was a critical success. Gobind Behari Lal of the San Francisco Examiner praised her as a “genius” and marveled at her productivity, noting that she painted between 50 and 100 pieces each year.
As the 1930s progressed, Hayakawa continued to exhibit her work with prestigious institutions around California. According to Wang’s research, her works were shown by the Francisco Society of Women Artists (1931), the Oakland Art League (1933, 1936, and 1937) and the Painters and Sculptors of Southern California organized by the Los Angeles Museum of Art (1936, 1937), among many others. From My Window, Hayakawa’s painting with the newly built Coit Tower seen through an open window, was included in SFAA’s 1935 show, which served as San Francisco Museum of Art’s inaugural exhibition.
Her paintings were also shown during the Golden Gate International Exposition of 1939-1940 as part of Golden Gate International Exhibition of Paintings in 1939, and Exhibition of Works by California Artists in 1940. These successes underscore her rising prominence in the California art scene.
Portraiture and Figure Paintings: Exploring Human Expression
Throughout her career, Hayakawa was particularly drawn to portraiture and figure painting. Her training at CSFA emphasized these genres, and she earned high marks from her instructors for her ability to capture the emotional depth of her subjects. This talent is evident in works like Yakima Indian Girl (1926) and Portrait of a Negro (1926), which blend realism with modernist influences to create portraits that convey both the physical likeness and the inner life of the sitter.
Critics recognized Hayakawa’s unique ability to bring out the humanity in her subjects. A 1936 review in Art Digest described her work as “imbued with grace and subtle introspection,” noting her sensitivity as a portraitist. Indeed, Hayakawa’s approach to portraiture was not merely about capturing a likeness; it was about delving into the complexities of the human condition. This deep empathy and understanding of her subjects made her a standout as a portrait painter.
Her brushwork was deliberate and fluid, often capturing more than just the physical characteristics of her subjects. In Portrait of a Negro (1926), she explored not only the outward appearance of her subject but also conveyed a sense of pride and resilience that was rarely depicted in mainstream art of the time. By humanizing her subjects in this way, Hayakawa seemed to challenge the prevailing racial and cultural stereotypes of the era.
Dr. ShiPu Wang has written extensively about Hayakawa’s ability to render her models with care and empathy, regardless of their race or social status. In our conversation, he noted:
Hayakawa approaches her models of different stripes with equal care and empathy, rendering them in deliberate brushwork and interweaving colors that build up the varying shapes and tones of the people she was depicting. Her layering brushstrokes imbue her paintings with a sense of fluidity that visualizes her models’ pulsating energy on the canvas’s surface and indicates her sitters’ inner qualities, as captured by her genuine interest in people of diverse backgrounds.
Her portraits serve as a testament to her keen observation of the complexities of identity, an observation informed by her personal experiences. Hayakawa’s interest and extraordinary accomplishment in portraiture is likely a reflection of her own search for identity—in depicting the other, she sought herself. As a Japanese American woman navigating the complexities of cultural duality, she understood the importance of exploring the layers of identity that make up a person. By focusing on portraits of individuals from different backgrounds, she explored the shared humanity beneath these socially constructed divisions.
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1. Dr. ShiPu Wang’s related publications include The Other American Moderns. Matsura, Ishigaki, Noda, Hayakawa (2017) and Pictures of Belonging: Miki Hayakawa, Hisako Hibi, and Miné Okubo (2023).
© 2024 Masako Hashigami Shinn
