Have you ever believed something so strongly that people from outside your bubble scorned you? Everyone you knew- your family, your co-workers and friends all embraced this belief and this belief became so empowering that you in turn were able to scorn the naysayers? This is a story of a community in Middle America who believe that the Japanese are secretly buying their little town with the intent of slowly destroying it. Destroying it by eroding union jobs at the local sand and brick factories. The very concept of foreigners buying the isolated town, making American children learn Japanese and ultimately bowing to an occupied government is a very real fear. In a show of American might, the message is clear, “Americans will not back down”, and to smack-down the faceless Japanese perpetrators the townsfolk oraganized an annual event of mass rice-burner destruction. Armed with sledgehammers, crowbars, chains, pipes and blowtorches the town destroys about 15 Japanese cars and motorcycles. Some are set on fire and dropped from a 150ft crane. To get the party started the adults drink beers and moonshine while the youngesters have a go at the rice-burners. They scream, “kamikaze” and “wax-on, wax-off”, while having a ball smashing as much glass as possible. This town might be isolated, but the same fear of a foreign occupied government is shared by hundreds of other small towns all across America.
We used to do these fake interviews with people. By fake I mean we’d interview idiots on the beach who thought we were taking them seriously. This one was with the empty headed beauties on the beach. The Diet-Coke Heads
Jim Goldberg is a Professor of Art at the California College of Arts and Crafts and a member of Magnum Photos. He has been exhibiting for over 30 years and his innovative use of image and text make him a landmark photographer of our times. He began to explore experimental storytelling and the potentials of combining image and text with “Rich and Poor”, (1977-85), where he juxtaposed the residents of welfare hotel rooms with the upper class and their elegantly furnished home interiors to investigate the nature of American myths about class, power, and happiness. In “Raised by Wolves” (1985-95), he worked closely with and documented runaway teenagers in San Francisco and Los Angeles to create a book and exhibition that combined original photographs, text, home movie stills, snapshots, drawings, diary entries as well as single and multi-channel video, sculpture, found objects, light boxes and other 3-D elements.
"This is a slice of America! These people are Americans. Some of these people are descendants of Indians. These people remember and if they don't their instincts do. And, those instincts remember what America was once like, gentlemen"
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