Janice Tanaka

Janice Tanaka is a Japanese-American media artist born in Hollywood, California [date?] known for making experimental videos. Tanaka is best known for Memories from the Department of Amnesia, an experimental documentary about the death of her mother, and Who's Going to Pay for These Donuts Anyway?, which chronicles the life of her father, who was interned in camps during World War II.

Tanaka started her career as a ballet dancer before studying music composition and later obtaining an MFA. She taught at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), the Columbia College Chicago, and California Institute of the Arts. She began her artistic career as a dancer before shifting her focus to film and documentaries.

Tanaka's parents—Jack Koto Tanaka and Lily Tanaka—married prior to World War II. The family was interned at the Manzanar Japanese Internment Camp during World War II following the signing of Executive Order 9066. Her father protested the internment, and was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. After being diagnosed with schizophrenia, he was institutionalized. Lily divorced Jack during the war, and moved the family to a predominantly white neighborhood in Chicago.

Tanaka's videos have been described as "documentary in style, using a variety of techniques; some images are abstract, distorted, and blurred to an unrecognizable degree, while others are clear and informal, as if they could be a family snapshot." Carnegie Museum of Art The Getty The Japanese American National Museum California The Institute of Kino Engineers (St. Petersburg, Russia) National Library of Australia The New York Public Library The University of Southern California University of California Los Angeles New York University University of Chicago

Awards Tanaka has received many awards: The American Film Institute Media Award The National Endowment for the Arts Media Award The Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Public Broadcasting Systems Media Awards Rockefeller Foundation Media Fellowship (1991 and 2003)