One Work: Ben Sakoguchi’s “Chinatown”

Scenes of metaphorical and physical assault pulse through Ben Sakoguchi’s painting Chinatown (2014), as he makes visible the violence Chinese Americans have endured for centuries in the United States. Some of the fifteen panels depict textbook historical events in comic book fashion; others collage contemporary examples of yellowface. Most striking are Sakoguchi’s representations of lesser-known episodes of anti-Chinese fervor. One section toward the upper right corner of Chinat