Wendy Maruyama

Wendy Maruyama is a furniture designer, installation artist, and professor emeritus of woodworking and furniture design at San Diego State University. After studying for two years at Boston University, Maruyama went on to complete her MFA from the Rochester Institute of Technology. She was one of the first women to graduate from the program. She frequently explores themes that stem from her Japanese heritage, as well as feminism and social practice.  She has exhibited around the country and is represented within many public and private collections, including at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Mint Museum of Art + Design, North Carolina. Maruyama was elected a Fellow of the American Craft Council in 2008.  

“The works trace my exploration of ethnicity and identity, and conclude with the Executive Order 9066 series, which addresses the internment of Japanese Americans in the US during World War II. 120,000 Japanese Americans were evacuated and removed from their homes along the West Coast, including my maternal family members. These works were profoundly influenced not only by my family history, but the images taken by Dorothea Lange, who was working for the US Government Service in documenting the internment process.” – Wendy Maruyama