You don’t normally associate Asian American artists to western art.
If you don’t, you probably haven’t seen the work of Harry Koyama.
The third generation Japanese American grew up in Montana in the 50s and 60s, and like so many other Japanese Americans of his age, grew up facing hatred and discrimination in the post-World War II era (Photos from Facebook).
He did not know at the time that his mentor and teacher Ben Steele was a former POW from the Bataan Death March.
Nor did Koyama know the impact he had on his teacher.
You see Steele now admits that he left the POW camps with bitter hatred toward the Japanese.
He took that hatred home and carried it for years.
When Koyama showed up in his classroom, those feelings of hatred came back. Harry was the first person of Japanese descent Steele had seen since his days of imprisonment.
So how did Steele overcome his hatred to menor Koyama and become such closed friends with him?
You can read about that in the Great Falls Tribune.
