Kellen Hatanaka

Kellen Hatanaka explores issues of contemporary culture in his multidisciplinary artistic practice. Hatanaka’s personal experiences as a Japanese-Canadian inform his creation of vibrant, figurative-based paintings and works on paper that examine the xenophobic, discriminatory undercurrents in sport and the community members who defy them. Hatanaka’s recent projects have particularly focused around the history of the Asahi Japanese-Canadian baseball team. Active from 1914 – 1942, the Asahi team rose to prominence and became a championship-winning dynasty before it was disbanded during World War II as a result of the Japanese-Canadian incarceration. The rise and fall of the team emerge as a metaphor for Hatanaka’s exploration of the loss of identity and culture experienced by Japanese-Canadians as a result of the incarceration, and the Asahi’s enduring legacy as a symbol of hope and pride in the face of deep racism and anti-Japanese sentiment.

Hatanaka’s 2024 Smokestack Published Project, The Sun Rises Wherever We Are represents Hatanaka’s most recent work in his ongoing visual investigations into the Asahi team.

Kellen Hatanaka is a visual artist based in Stratford, ON. His work has been presented and distributed in a multitude of forms across Canada and internationally in the United States, including public painted murals, gallery and museum exhibitions, and publication features in Victory Journal, ArtMaze Magazine and Graphite Journal. In 2016 he was awarded the Governor General’s Award with Jon-Erik Lappano for their book, Tokyo Digs a Garden.