Rea Tajiri is a filmmaker and visual artist who earned her BFA and MFA degree from the California Institute of the Arts in post-studio art. Her groundbreaking, award-winning film, digital video and installation work has been supported by numerous grants, fellowships, and artistic residencies, and has been exhibited widely in museums, on television, and in international film festivals. Poetic, subtly layered and politically engaged, Tajiri’s work advances the exploration of forgotten histories, multi-generational memory, landscape, and the Japanese American experience. Her experimental documentary History and Memory: For Akiko & Takashige (1991) and feature film Strawberry Fields (1997) have influenced a generation of filmmakers and have become canonical films in Asian American Studies, Cinema Studies, and Women’s and Gender Studies curricula in the US. As an advocate for emerging artists and directors, Rea co-founded The Workshop, an incubator for Asian American film directors in New York City. Currently, she is an Associate Professor in the Film Media Arts Department at Temple University, where she teaches documentary production.
Selected Awards, Grants & Fellowships: IDA Distinguished Achievement Award, 1992; Grand Prix, Fukuoka Asian International Film Festival, 1998; Pew Project Grant (2018); Center for Asian American Media Documentary Award (2016, 2018); National Endowment for the Arts Visual Arts Fellow (1989, 1993); New York State Council for the Arts (1989, 1992, 1998), Presidents Art and Humanities Grant (2016, 2017).
