Weston Teruya
Told from across the distance reinterprets an iconic archival photograph from the Third World Liberation Front to understand how movements built on cross-racial solidarity between communities of color are retold and morph in our cultural imaginary across time. The sculptural work draws on culturally rooted celebratory forms–festival lanterns and large papier-mâché–to hint at how these histories have been transformed into larger-than-life stories that at times mask the complexities of those spaces and movements.
Weston Teruya was born and raised in Honolulu, Hawai‘i and currently resides in Oakland, California. As an artist, he has had solo exhibitions at Intersection for the Arts and Patricia Sweetow Gallery in San Francisco and Pro Arts in Oakland. Teruya has also exhibited at the Mills College Art Museum in Oakland, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Southern Exposure, and Kearny Street Workshop in San Francisco, Longhouse Projects & the NYC Fire Museum in New York, Hiromi Yoshii Gallery in Tokyo, the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, and the Palo Alto Art Center. Weston has received grants from Artadia, the Center for Cultural Innovation’s Investing in Artists program, and the Creative Work Fund. He has been an artist-in-residence with the Lucas Artist Residency of the Montalvo Arts Center, Art+Practice+Ideas at Mills College, Recology San Francisco, Sedona Summer Colony, and Ox-Bow. In 2017 he will be a Fellowship Awardee resident with Kala Art Institute and a deYoung Museum Artists Studio resident. Weston received an MFA in Painting and Drawing and MA in Visual & Critical Studies from California College of the Arts. He has a BA in Studio art and minor in Asian American Studies from Pomona College.
Alongside his studio practice, Weston served as an appointed member of the Berkeley Civic Arts Commission where he chaired the grants committee and served on the policy committee. He also worked for the Community Investments program (formerly Cultural Equity Grants) of the San Francisco Arts Commission for eight years. He has been a grant panelist and juror for institutions including the Center for Cultural Innovation, Headlands Center for the Arts, Southern Exposure’s Alternative Exposure, and California College of the Arts.
Weston is one of the three founding members of Related Tactics, a collective of artists, writers, curators, and educators of color creating projects and opportunities at the intersection of race and culture. And through a partnership with the online arts criticism platform Daily Serving-Art Practical, he recently launched (un)making, a podcast in discussion with artists, arts administrators, and cultural workers of color to discuss their lives, practices, and careers.