KQED Youth Takeover: Oakland Ballet Explores Immigrant Stories From Angel Island
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Learn more at Xfinity.com. Restrictions apply. Xfinity, internet required. Actual speeds vary. From KQED. From KQED in San Francisco, I'm Alexis Madrigal. Next month, the Oakland Ballet Company will premiere Angel Island Project, an ambitious, genre-bending dance production highlighting the stories of immigrants, mostly from China, who were detained at the Angel Island Immigration Station in the early 20th century.

We'll talk with a group of choreographers and a local historian about translating these stories for the stage and for this moment when the rights of immigrants are under attack. That's all coming up next, right after this news. Welcome to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal.

You know, there are two faces to American immigration policy. One's represented by Ellis Island, a Statue of Liberty in New York's harbor. This is the welcoming face of the United States, the one that says, give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. And then there's the other face, Angel Island, specifically the Angel Island Immigration Station, where many would-be Asian immigrants were detained and

Instead of Emma Lazarus's poem, We Have Susie Oye Lum Fongs, she was detained on the island for three months and wrote a poem about that time that she shared with her family. Her daughter, Victoria Fong, translated it like this. 50 years ago, locked up in this building. After three days interrogation, the punishment was deportation. Every day I cried for fear of going back. Every night I am uneasy as I hear the waves crashing angrily.

It's remembrances like this that inspired the Oakland Ballet to put together a performance commemorating what this place was and the darker side of American immigration policy it represents today.

We're going to get into the ballet. We're going to get into Angel Island. But first, I want to note that this show was produced by two Bay Area high school students as part of KQED's annual youth takeover. They join us here first to talk about what interested them in these histories. First up, we've got Maite Del Real, who is a junior at Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts.

Welcome, Maite. Thank you for having me. We also have Nico Fisher, who's a junior at Santa Clara High School, joining us again this year. Welcome, Nico. Happy to be here. So talk to me. Why did you get interested in the ballet, Nico? I think that Angel Island has always been in the background for Bay Area kids like me. It's something we've seen our whole lives, just sitting there, almost in the background, right? Quiet, distant, and mysterious. And its history has always been half-taught.

never fully explored from the emotional lens, right, of the people that were detained there. And I think the ballet brings that history and those emotions to the front. It makes you actually feel the presence in the history. It makes it alive and emotional, and it turns it into something that's more than just a place or a landmark.

And I think as someone who grew up here, you know, surrounded by immigrants and the children of immigrants, it's so powerful to see that immigrant experience told through art. Dance like really expresses what words can't sometimes. It captures the hopes, captures the waiting, and it captures the literal poetry on the walls. And it makes the history feel personal. And for me, it's really just about honoring those unheard Bay Area voices. That's cool. Mighty, how about you?

What interests me most about this ballet, the Angel Island Project, is how a group of artists came together to bring to life the stories and poetry of the Chinese immigrants who were detained at Angel Island. It's not just a performance. It's a collaboration between dance, music, history, and visual storytelling. Mike, are you a dancer or just an appreciator? Appreciator.

And do you, you know, the poems that we're referencing here, we're going to talk more about the history of them later, but they were sort of carved into the walls, right? Yes. Of the actual detention center. And what do you, what was it about that fact or those poems that kind of interested you? What interested me about the poems was how they stayed on.

through history, decades on the walls and carved of people's stories and their lives during that period of time and how it's moved so many people to this day to creating a project like this. You know, we were also talking before the show that, you know, you grew up in San Francisco. You know, your mom, one of her mentors with Ruth Asawa, shout out to last week's show on the retrospective at Moment. Did you know this history going in or was this something that you learned through this project?

So growing up in San Francisco, I was aware of Angel Island, but not until this past year in my AP U.S. History class did I really learn about Angel Island and its use over history in the Bay Area. Either of you ever been out there? Yes. Yeah. What was it like? It's very heartwarming experience.

And something you really appreciate when you see I went to the immigration station and it really changed my perspective on the Bay Area and how people have overcame such difficult times. Yeah. Just kind of connecting into so many different people's experiences here in the Bay. Yes. Nico, local history is.

Do you know, I think there's a perception among some of our listeners, perhaps that young people are less interested in local history. What do you think? What does it do for you? Well, I think my life is the antithesis of that perspective. I recently finished writing a book project on San Jose activism. So I spent a lot of time thinking about this question. And I think to sum it up shortly, we are more powerful as a community when we know our history and we experience it together.

History allows us to know what's happened in the past and allows us to make informed, active decisions about what we want the future to look like in our communities. But at the same time, local history isn't accessible to so many people. Folks don't have time to go into archives.

They don't have time always to read books or they don't, you know, want to. But yet we all deserve to experience the emotions and the facts of local history. And what the Angel Island Project does is it brings that history to a new audience. And to me, this project is fulfilling the definition of community history, education by the people for the people. Yeah.

Maite, how about local arts? Have you been engaged with them through your growing up? Yes. I was fortunate enough to attend Alvarado Elementary School in San Francisco. The arts program was founded by Ruth

Ruth Asawa. And she really championed the importance of arts in education. And that played a key role in integrating the arts in San Francisco, which is the school district I attend my entire life. And right now I'm a student at Ruth Asawa School of the Arts High School. Lucky. And yeah.

And yeah, from a young age, my parents have enrolled me in a wide range of art classes, dance, painting, ceramics, singing, acting. And they didn't just keep me busy, but they kept me curious and passionate about the arts. That's awesome. You know, let's bring in Graham Lustig, who is artistic director of the Angel Island Project and the Oakland Ballet Company. Welcome. Good morning.

So this ballet is kind of an outgrowth, right, of other creative projects that have kind of been circling around the kind of power and poetry of Angel Island. Can you tell us a little bit more about sort of the origins of the project?

The origins of the project are really in the poetry. The poetry that was written as protest poetry all those years ago. And in 1940, when the military took over those buildings, they filled that graffiti, they filled it with putty, they covered it with paint. But with the resilience of humanity and the power of the word,

the paint started peeling and the poetry revealed themselves. So that is kind of, it starts with that poetry and I think that what we are doing is bringing that poetry to life

through a different language, and that's the language of dance. Yeah. And that poetry got turned into music, right, by a composer? Absolutely. So Del Sol Quartet, who have had a real strong interest in the telling of stories of Angel Island, commissioned Huang Rouh,

to turn some of those poems into songs. And so we have Volte, the San Francisco Choral Ensemble, and the Del Sol Quartet performing with us. And it's an oratorio that lasts 90 minutes. And so what does that mean for those of us who are unfamiliar with this terminology? Oratorio means... Oh, basically, it's a song cycle. It's a song cycle, and we hear some really powerful words. Some words are taken from the Page Act.

and others are just historical reports from the time. And I think that it's a dark subject. Invited seven different choreographers from different perspectives to contribute their ideas and enrich our dance. We've taken the dancers, the board, and the staff to Angel Island. We performed there in March twice. I wanted the dancers to have the richness of experience actually being outside with the

waves behind the wind in their hair but also looking at those buildings and feeling the gravity because I wanted to enrich them so that when they go to the theatre on the 4th of May they can bring that knowledge and expertise and even that profound feeling that you can't it's unavoidable when you're there

What did they say about that, like performing these pieces in the place where these poems were written? It was incredibly meaningful. And this is an immigration story that's shared by many more than just the Chinese community. And one of my dancers, who is a Latina, said that she found it to be so moving to be there because she knew of the difficulties of the journeys of her grandparents and her parents to establish lives here in America. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So there have been these preview shows, including these ones out at Angel Island. Yes. What will the sort of

main production? Where will that be? How can people see it? We're performing at the beautiful Paramount Theatre on Sunday, May the 4th at 3 o'clock. If the audience would like to come early, the theatre opens at 2. We're going to have a history display about the Angel Island in the lobby. There are going to be biographies of the various artists, musicians, dancers and choreographers. So there's going to be something there to see and possibly have a beverage before you sit down because it is a 90-minute performance.

Peace with no intermission. Give us a sense of how the show begins. Like just set the scene for us. With pleasure. Choreographer Wei Wang begins with a group of travelers. They're wearing long coats and

They have suitcases and baggages and they're trying to get somewhere. And every time they get close, they get sent back and they get close and they get sent. So it has a strong sense of diagonal. So it's a group of people beginning a journey. And then choreographer Feng Yi decided to do something remarkable, which was to take the traditional hair of a thick plaited braid, but made it 40 feet long.

The dancer feels this as both a weight that she carries from her homeland, but also something that's precious that she carries in her arms. At times, the other dancers get caught in it. And when I asked E, why does the dancer wear a boat on her head? It's very unusual to see a ballerina standing around balancing a boat. But she said the boat represents the journey. It represents the danger and the unknown future.

The piece finishes with a work by Phil Chan. The stage fills with a mist as if it's blown in from the sea. One by one, the dancers kneel down onto the stage. They're wearing white shrouds. And Phil says, each one a mountain. And so that is our journey. Yeah.

We're going to talk with a couple of choreographers after the break. We're talking about the Angel Island Immigration Detention Center and the Oakland Ballet's new performance about an Angel Island project, which premieres May 4th. You've just been listening to Graham Lustig, artistic director at the Angel Island Project and Oakland Ballet Company. Shows produced as part of KQED's Youth Takeover by Nico Fisher, who's a senior at Santa Clara High School, and Maite Del Real, who's a junior at Ruth Asawa. Are you a student or a senior?

Junior. A junior at Santa Clara High School. That's what I thought. And of course, we want to hear from you. Did somebody in your family immigrate to the Bay Area through Angel Island? Give us a call. 866-733-6786. Forum at KQED.org. We'll be back with more right after the break.

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Welcome back to Forum. Alexis Madrigal here. We're talking about the Angel Island Immigration Detention Center and the Oakland Ballet's new performance about it. It's called Angel Island Project and it premieres May 4th. We've got the artistic director of the Oakland Ballet Company, Graham Listig, here with us. This show was produced as part of KQED's Youth Takeover by Nico Fisher, a junior at Santa Clara High, and Maite Del Real, who is a junior at Ruth Asawa. And we're going to talk about the show.

We're going to bring in some more voices. We'd love to hear from you. If you've visited the Angel Island Immigration Station before, what was your experience of that place? Or maybe your family's story came through Angel Island. We'd love to hear that as well. The number is 866-733-6786. That's 866-733-6786.

You can send those experiences to forum at kqed.org. You can find us on social media, Blue Sky, Instagram, etc. We're KQED Forum, or you can head over to the Discord. Can add a few more voices from this project here in the studio with me. We have Feng Ye, who is a choreographer with the Angel Island Project. Welcome. Morning. We also have Phil Chan, another choreographer with the Angel Island Project and the co-founder of Final Bow for Yellow Face. Welcome, Phil.

Morning, friends. Great to have you. And we're joined by Ed Tephorn, who is executive director of the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation. Welcome, Ed. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. So, you know, we have referenced these poems a few times. I wanted you, Ed, to give us a sense of like the kind of scope of what was on the walls and kind of its...

It feels like it's kind of historically unique to have this kind of first person experience of detention carved into the walls of a facility like this.

Absolutely. There's that expression, "If walls could talk." And at Angel Island Immigration Station, they actually do. The poems that were carved into the walls, there's over 200 of them that were left by Chinese immigrants who were detained at the Angel Island Immigration Station. The station was open from 1910 to 1940. And in those 30 years, about a million people from 80 different countries were processed or detained at Angel Island.

The majority of those immigrants were from Asia and the Pacific, Chinese, Japanese, as well as several other Asian Pacific Islander countries. And it's interestingly only the Chinese immigrants who wrote poems into the walls. And we think that partly that is due to their length of detention. They were the group that experienced the longest periods of detention on the island.

But these poems really do give us a glimpse into what their lives behind bars were. They truly were incarcerated. They experienced those feelings of desperation, of

anger, but also the continued determination and hope of wanting to create a new life for themselves and for their families. And all of those experiences and emotions make their way into the content of these poems. Yeah, I was wondering, like, if you had to sort of do a pie chart, I mean, how much of this is longing for home? How much is describing the treatment that they're receiving from the United States? How much is like dog roll to kind of pass the time?

Wow, a pie chart. I've never thought of it in that regard. Maybe not a literal pie chart, but, you know, a sense of the breadth of the poetry. I mean, definitely the poems do cover a range of different things. Some of the poems talk about life under the tension, the frustration of that, the poor conditions that they were lived in, in cramped and crowded rooms that were only supposed to hold 50 people at a time, which would sometimes hold 200 people.

The poor quality of the food, and we know from historical records, the U.S. government spent more money on the European immigrants' meals than they did on the Asian immigrants' meals. There's definitely also poems that are sent as messages to other immigrants who were held in detention or to immigrants who would be held in detention after the authors of the poem were there.

There were also different poems that talk about what the immigrants left behind. And for anyone who has had to make that difficult choice of leaving your homeland, there's so many forces that push and pull us. And it's important to always remember that.

that people do not make these choices lightly. And so for many of the immigrants who came through Angel Island, they were escaping famine, they were escaping poor conditions, they were escaping dangerous situations. And I think many of those themes for what push and pull immigrants to the U.S. continue on until today. Do you have a favorite?

Do I have a favorite? I do have a favorite poem. There's a poem called Random Thoughts Deep at Night. And what that...

What really gives us a glimpse into is just the emotions of what it felt like for someone to experience detention, not knowing how long they would be held in detention, not knowing when they were going to be called forward to undertake their interrogations that would make the decision of whether or not they would be allowed into the country. Wow.

Let's bring in someone who has had the challenge of sort of interpreting these poems. Do you want to talk about how do you take words carved into a wall and the space of Angel Island and make dance?

As my in the dance piece, I use the two different objects like one long braid like over 10 meters in one of the small boats. So I want to use those objects to represent the time in space because I add a lot Chinese culture in there.

The long braid will have a very special meaning in Chinese culture.

And they have some small story about myself. And also in my piece, I used the long braid to connect people. It's like means support each other or separate people. The space changed, extension the space. It's like shore to shore. It's like you can feeling the lonely and the sufferer.

Yeah, also, you know, here it's a dozen to boat, a road, right? Decade? It's like keep the memory over the time. Yeah, the long time. Yeah.

So from my experience, when I was very young, like a baby, my mother shaved all my hair when I turned 100 days old. And she kept it in a small box in the

She told me, okay, one day if you get married, I will give as a gift to your husband. It's very meaningful, you know, in the Chinese people, culture, history. So I used the long braid to re-spawn the history and the feeling, the emotion. That's beautiful. Phil Chan, do you want to talk about your kind of interpretation and sort of what inspired it?

Sure. Yeah, so I've got two sections on the program, the sixth section and then the closing section. But I really love the ending. It uses the whole company, and it's just waves of bodies coming forward. You see them shifting, diving into each other. You see these waves growing, and it's quite meditative. They're all wearing these sort of translucent white soft robes and clothes

Yeah, it's waves of people. It's waves of history. It's waves, literal waves of the ocean. And it's, you know, just this undeniable progress forward. So, you know, we talk about some of the darker issues in the ballet, but this is a final moment for us to be hopeful and to look forward and to also channel some of the

resilience that a lot of immigrants who come to America ultimately bring with them. And it sort of burns through us and it forces us to be resilient. And, you know, just wanting to share that side of the beauty in that too, which I think is universal for many Americans. We have immigrant stories, you know,

And so how do we, how can we all see that and feel that? And so it closes on this beautiful note. And as Graham was describing at the end, the dancers sort of individually come down and they sort of place themselves and, you know, this wave of dry ice comes in and they look like,

mountains like Chinese mountains, you know, just sort of these, these shapes floating above the mist sort of evoking both of the homeland, but also the potential of the future. And also looks like the San Francisco Bay area. Yeah. It just has a lot of these poetic layers that, that,

you can translate poetry into a visual poetry. And so creating those moments for the audience. So I think that's what audience members will really expect when they come to see a show like this is just something beautiful and something that can resonate with everybody. And especially in this moment, we need to feel connected. Yeah.

with each other and this piece does that so really looking forward to sharing with you folks Graham how did the choreographers interact with each other like did they get to see each other's pieces did you keep them in isolation were they swapping ideas like how did that work

We began the project in 2024 in the spring with three of the pieces being created because 90 minutes is a lot of choreography to create in one season. So we began and we previewed those works as a sort of workshop and those we were able to share with the new incoming choreographers this spring. So everybody's been aware of what's going on. They've had opportunities to share ideas. We're working together with the lighting designer and most particularly with the costume designers to make sure that the

The costume story is one that's a complete story, but also that takes us also on a colour journey. The inside of the immigration station back in the day was painted a green colour and some poetry refers to it as a jade prison.

So the colours of the sky, the colours of the earth and the colours of jade have been an important starting point for the design process. And also, we have 12 dancers. If someone says, oh, I'm going to have seven dancers in my piece, they can't have seven in the next. We need to give those dancers a break.

So, you know, that was also a way that we passed out, you know, pas de deux, duets, trios and ensemble pieces. And the choreographers have been incredibly generous listening to each other. We've been shaping this whole work. So it works for us all. Gosh, you know, that green detail is one of those that really sticks with you, right? Where just the texture of history, I think, can get so kind of flattened out. You know, you're looking at black and white photographs. You're looking...

you know, through historians' eyes, and then you just get one detail, you know, the screen of the room, and it feels like it brings it to light in a different way. We were talking about the Angel Island Immigration Detention Center and the Oakland Ballet's new performance around it premieres May 4th. We've got Graham Lustig, who is artistic director of the Angel Island Project and Oakland Ballet Company. We've got Phil Chan, who's a choreographer with the Angel Island Project.

Project and co-founder of Final Bow for Yellowface. We have Feng Ye, who is choreographer with the Angel Island Project. And we've got Ed Tepporn, who is executive director of the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation. You know, earlier, you might have heard the two high school students who produced this show, Nico Fisher, a junior at Santa Clara High, and Maite Del Real, who is a junior at Ruth Asawa.

Love to get to some more calls and comments. If your family has an immigration story to the Bay Area that routed through Angel Island, we'd love to hear that. Or maybe you've just visited Angel Island Immigration Station before. What was that experience like for you? You can give us a call, 866-733-6786. Or you can email forum at kqed.org. Let's bring in a first call here. Let's bring in Rick in San Jose. Welcome.

Good morning. Years ago, I visited Angel Island with a group of church friends for a bike day, a bike trip day. And I write poetry. And so the poetry in a lot of the buildings just was taken by that. But it was about this time of year. And the thing that

struck me so strongly was kind of the metaphor, the analogy of the exodus from Israel that the Israelites undertook, you know, the famous story that we know as somebody who's having a religion of trying to find a promised land and of trying to be free and get to this place. So

That made a really, really strong impression on me. I grew up in the rural Central Valley and know so many migration stories, not of these stories, but of others. And it just has left a lasting impression for all these decades. Yeah. Thanks so much, Rick. I really, really appreciate that experience. You know, one thing that occurred to me is, did these stories or these poems...

Remind you of anything, you know, in like deep Chinese history or stories like stories of migration or change in the, you know, Rick was sort of referencing the Israelites. Were there things in Chinese history that kind of reminded you of?

Yes, for me, I'm new in grade. So I'm, I came from China about nine years. So I can feel the same feeling, the emotion, you know, always I have a very stronger lonely homesick.

So that's why I add a lot Chinese culture element in my dance piece. And always I focus my dance work about my own experience, immigrant experience in the family and Chinese culture. So that's why I want to share my piece, represent. It's not about only that history. I want to let

give the space to audience to thinking about where are we come from where because Everyone come from different place and I won't let them to thinking. What are you your family culture your your Hometown yeah the history so that's why I want to give the more space. Yes. Yeah, I

Also, earlier Ed was talking about this poem, Random Thoughts Deep at Night. Pulled that up and boy, it really speaks to some of the universality of some of these experiences. I should read it for us here for folks who haven't heard it. This is by Yu of Taishan. In the quiet of night, I heard faintly the whistling of wind. The forms and shadows saddened me. Upon seeing the landscape, I composed a poem.

The floating clouds, the fog darken the sky. The moon shines faintly as the insects chirp. Grief and bitterness entwined are heaven sent. The sad person sits alone, leaning by a window. I mean, Ed, that is particularly just like the bits of Bay Area that are sort of embedded in that, but also the universal themes.

They really are universal themes. And a lot of times when I'm leading tours for people who are visiting the island and the immigration station for the first time,

I encourage them to look out at this beautiful scene they see in front of them while they're standing inside these detention barrack rooms. And so there is something about the juxtaposition of the natural beauty of the Bay Area, the sea, the air that you can see from these windows, but you're looking at this beauty from behind gated windows.

And so I encourage visitors to put themselves into the shoes of immigrants who were experiencing detention on Angel Island. The weight of expectation that they might be carrying with them, oftentimes a family or a village would pull all their money to send this one person to the U.S. for them to be able to make a living and potentially send resources back home. But instead of being allowed into the U.S., you're stuck here in this detention barrack behind gated walls.

windows and gated doors, not knowing when you'd be able to leave. And there's so many poems like Random Thoughts Deep at Night that really do give us a glimpse into what emotions and experiences these immigrants were undergoing. And hopefully, for any visitor who comes to Angel Island and visits this immigration station, they have the opportunity to feel that sense of connection to what it might

feel like to me to feel like you don't belong and to think about how the experiences of these immigrants over a hundred years ago in so many ways parallel the the hopes and the experiences of immigrants who are coming to the U.S. today and through that memory perhaps have that opportunity to rethink about how we can truly make this country more welcoming for all

We're talking about the Oakland Ballet's new performance about Angel Island. Premieres May 4th. We're joined by Ed Tephorn, executive director of the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation. Fang Ye, who is choreographer at Angel Island Project. Phil Chan, choreographer at Angel Island Project. And Graham Lustig, who's artistic director of the Oakland Ballet Company. I'm Alexis Madrigal. Stay tuned for more right after the break.

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Welcome back to Forum. Alexis Madrigal here. We're talking about the Oakland Ballet's new performance about the Angel Island project. It premieres May 4th. We've got a couple choreographers, artistic director, as well as Ed Tephorn from the

Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation. This show was produced by two high school students as part of KQED's Youth Takeover Week. We've got Maite Del Real, who is a junior at Ruth Asawa, and Nico Fisher, who's a junior at Santa Clara.

Clara High. We're also taking your calls, taking your comments about your feelings about Angel Island Immigration Station or maybe your family's story if it routed through this particular place. You can give us a call at 866-733-6786.

Ed, one thing, a listener over on our Discord says, my great-grandparents came through Angel Island. My great-grandfather was what they call a, quote, paper boy. He came and left many times until they found out that he could choose to stay here or go back to China, and he chose to stay here. Maybe you can fill us in a little bit more on what a paper boy was and how this played into sort of U.S. immigration policy.

Absolutely. The experience of paper sons and daughters refers to this practice where immigrants who had actually been born in China came forward claiming that they were the sons or daughters of U.S. citizens. And immigration laws at the time were such that if a U.S. citizen had a son or daughter born abroad, they could bring those sons and daughters to the U.S.,

A lot of this was an attempt by immigrants to circumnavigate the existing unfair immigration policies at the time. We had immigration laws like the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the Immigration Act of 1917, of 1924. And all these immigration policies essentially were created to try to keep Asian and Pacific Islander immigrants from entering the US as well as from becoming US citizens.

And so these paper sons and daughters were an underground business practice, if you will, where individuals took on these alleged identities as a way for them to potentially be able to come to the U.S. Let's bring in Matthew in Sunnyvale. Talk about kind of this newly contested history. Matthew, welcome. Hey, thank you.

Oh, go ahead. Yeah, sure. I'm Matthew Spangler. I'm a professor at San Jose State University, and I'm calling from Sunnyvale. But yeah, I just wanted to say that thank you for the discussion today. But also, I had received a federal grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to organize a summer institute on the topic of immigration to the Bay Area.

We would have done that this summer, and Angel Island figured prominently in that. And about 10 days ago, Doge terminated the grant out of the blue. We are in the midst of planning for it, and so I'm just grateful to hear the discussion today, and for the Oakland Ballet. Thank you for your incredible work. You know, it's interesting, Matthew. I kind of thought it was a settled thing that we were just going to do these kinds of histories, that we were going to learn the real history of the country, but it seems like

There are some forces that don't want this to happen. Do you think, Graham, that that makes this particular kind of work? I don't want to say important, but maybe like more meaningful, given that there are these attacks on this history, like the one that Matthew's talking about of canceling grants and things like that.

This project was born in 2023. It was a different climate, a different time, but we still wanted to show our respect and share the importance of these stories. Well, of course, I think that things have shifted since then quite dramatically. And we are not, as an arts organization, trying to play into politics in a way, but we do believe that... Yeah, you are. Come on. But I do believe that we have...

Something that is an incredibly human story performed by humans. And it's going to be very meaningful. And as I've tried to explain, it's not we just don't look at the dark history. As Phil described, we are going to feel a real sense of spiritual enlightenment and fulfillment at the end of this journey. So, yeah, I think it's important to share these stories. And the ballet has not been known in the last decade.

few centuries for being very inclusive. So we're trying to make a shift there, you know? You know, Jennifer writes in to say, I saw the Oakland Ballet performance on Angel Island and was amazed by the dancers, the choreography, and the story. I've been in the Bay Area for 30 years now, and I didn't know the real story of Angel Island until recently.

You know, Graham, to your point about the ballet's inclusivity, etc., this performance kind of brings together some influences to the ballet, right, from kind of other dance traditions? Yeah.

Absolutely. We have choreographers who are definitely rooted in the classical tradition. But one of the reasons that I was so delighted that E accepted my invitation is because her dancing is literally earthed in a different style. Ballet is often lifting away from the floor and going, you know, verticality. Whereas in her style of dance, it's much more grounded. The gravity is much more deeper and is deeper in the body. And the weight is further back. Absolutely.

And I think it's very wonderful for our dancers to have the honor of working with her and understanding a different style. That's beautiful. Phil, do you want to talk about this as well? Sort of how you approach the ballet with this particular kind of subject matter?

Yeah, so it was, you know, I'm classically trained ballet technique, but also I'm from Hong Kong, so trained in Chinese dance as well. And so bringing those two things together doesn't seem strange for me. It's like, oh, this is like a different class, you know, that we would just have to take. And so fusing those two things together,

one of the dynamics in Chinese dance and Peking opera is roundness, like a roundedness is prized. Whereas classical ballet is all about line, about like how long can you stretch your body in one direction? So it looks like you're reaching for the heavens. You know, whereas in Chinese dance, there's a lot of emphasis on how round was that? What did that spiral beautifully? Is there a circle to that? And so how do you bring that

as a generative device to make ballet, which is a linear form and play with those circles and play with fusing the, you know, two different cultural styles in a way that works for a human being who is standing in a pointe shoe in the 21st century. I was about to say, how does one achieve roundness?

You're going to have to buy a ticket and check it out on May 4th. I mean, I know how I achieve roundness. I'm just wondering how ballet dancers do. You know, as a retired dancer, it involves eating a lot of pizza, but I love it.

You know, Denise writes in with her family story as well. You know, both of my parents, she writes, and both of my husband's parents were immigrants. We took our children and grandchildren to visit Angel Island. It brought out different emotions, pride for the intellect and artistry of the early immigrants and anger for the racial discrimination that they suffered during detention in deplorable conditions while thousands of European immigrants were welcomed at Ellis Island.

You know, I mean, I know I obviously made this comparison as and many other people are as well kind of, you know, drawing this distinction between Angel Island worked and how Ellis Island worked. That is grounded in reality. Right. I mean, it's it feels like a metaphor, but it also was the way things were working. Right. A much smaller percentage of immigrants were turned away from Ellis Island than at Angel Island.

Definitely. The Angel Island Immigration Station is sometimes called the Ellis Island of the West as you referenced earlier.

And the reality though is that while they were both US immigration stations, they were both the largest immigration stations on their respective coasts, it was a very different experience for Asian immigrants at Angel Island. By and large, Asian immigrants experienced more invasive medical examinations where they had to strip completely naked. It's not something that the European immigrants at Ellis Island were forced to endure. They experienced more intensive interrogations that could last hours, sometimes even days.

and they experienced longer periods of detention. On average, the Chinese immigrants who were held at Angel Island were there for days, weeks, months, as long as two years. For other Asian immigrants at Angel Island, it was typically a couple of days or perhaps a week.

that they were held in detention. And then for European immigrants, it was more often in the range of days. But you compare that to the experience of European immigrants at Ellis Island, who typically only spent a couple of hours on Ellis Island before they were allowed into the U.S. As a more recent immigrant, when you visited Angel Island, what feelings did it bring up for you?

Wow, it's like, I'm, it's no, no time. I think I'm just, it's like 100 years ago. Yes. And I really, really, because I read the poem on the wall. And I think, okay, this is a

what my thoughts and what my feeling because when I come here I cannot speak English and I don't have a friend I want to support I want to get a new friend

But everything, it's like lying, you know? It's like, sure, I'm very lonely. So, yeah. I keep the feeling and put on my every dance work. Yes. The homesick, it's always there. Always there for the immigrant. So that's why I have a, I use the long braid. It's like always there. The sad person sits alone, leaning by a window. Yeah.

Let's bring in Lev in Oakland. Welcome. Hello. I wanted to add some context that I had learned pretty recently about Angel Island and what came after Angel Island. I learned...

You know, it burned down in a fire in 1940, and after it burned down, they were looking for a new place to detain immigrants, and they ended up detaining them in 1945 in Sansom Street in San Francisco, where they were doing a lot of the same, you know, people were waiting for months, being questioned, detained. And I learned the history of a woman who died, who committed suicide in 1948, and

uh... uh... be after having been enough for three months without any communication with the outside world and um... and then there's a a hunger strike there and the uh... the chinese government got involved the local uh... china chinese papers got involved and it shut down in nineteen fifty five

But even today, after that it became, well more recently it's become like an ice field office in that same building on the fifth floor. And people are still brought there today after they're picked up by ice. They're taken to that same building in Sansom Street. So it feels like it never really ended. It just sort of transmogrified or changed.

Lev, what a good point. I mean, yeah, preceding it, we had, I think it was called the Pacific Steamship Company building where people were held before they created the Angel Island, you know, immigration station. And then, yeah, as you're noting, it's like it's not when it was, I think it was a women's dormitory and administration building burned down in 40. Right. And then that's when they the immigration station moved to Sansom Street. I mean, do you do you want to chip in anything on that on that history?

There's definitely layers of history out at Angel Island. So the immigration station sits on just 15 acres of the entire 750 acre site. So when you think about what people can learn about and connect with at Angel Island, it goes all the way back to the Coast Miwoks who were the, the original stewards of the island to, uh,

buildings that date back as far as the Civil War to World War I, World War II. And so the immigration station is just one part of the chapter of Angel Island's history and U.S. history. But one other chapter connected directly to the immigration station is during World War II, because the administration building burned down, and that is where women and girls were held in detention, men and boys were in a separate building.

But because that administration building burned down, the site stopped being used as an immigration station, but the military took the site back over and turned the remaining buildings, constructed additional buildings, and the site was then used to hold enemy POWs from Germany, Italy, and Japan, as well as about 700 Japanese and Japanese Americans immediately after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Wow.

And those Japanese Americans were deemed enemy aliens simply because the U.S. was at war with Japan. The country used this law to be able to detain these individuals who simply were journalists, were martial artists, were religious leaders, people who the government thought might have a stronger tie to Japan than to the U.S., ultimately

There was never any proof that any of these individuals held in detention had committed any act of crime against the U.S. A listener on Discord writes, do the choreographers see parallels between the anti-immigrant movement when the Chinese Exclusion Act was in place and the anti-immigration movement today? And Phil, I think I'll send this one to you.

I think this is a beautiful reflection of what this project has been about. So at the height of COVID,

You know, we were a lot of ballet companies around the country were asking how we can how we can help support Asian people. And one of the things that in my work as an advocate, I said, well, hire more Asian artists. In 2019, only three commissions went to Asian artists and the shooting in Atlanta happened and, you know,

I challenged ballet companies to hire more Asian choreographers. In the meantime, Graham at Oakland was taking on this leadership of saying, hey, why don't we dedicate an entire festival to Asian American choreographers, but also costume designers, composers,

and so started the Dancing Moons Festival in 2021. He was actually the first American company to dedicate an entire program to AAPI choreographers in the country. And so from that first festival, that's what this current program has become. We're now at the Paramount. It's this huge production with a huge chorus and telling a really strong story

special hometown story. Thinking about the timeliness of immigration, you know, that's part of our American story. It's not just a fad. We aren't doing this again for because it's a hot topic in the moment. It's always been a hot topic. And I think that reinforces why we need to keep stories like Angel Island alive, because we're repeating these stories again and again. And so what can we learn from the past? What can we learn from other people who've gone through this?

So I think another way to tell that story through dance, you know, the beauty and resilience of the human spirit in a way that words sometimes can inspire but not fully capture. I think that's what this project is about. So, yeah, there are parallels, but that's how Oakland Ballet Company is actually addressing this in the community. Yeah.

Graham, last thing, you've got this performance on Sunday, May 4th, 3 o'clock, Paramount Theatre. Are there going to be other performances? What are the plans for the show after this? It's a complicated and kind of expensive production to put together. And at the ballet, we're always looking for funding.

As you know, especially since the pandemic with corporate funding and, you know, very much in demand. We are planning to bring it to San Francisco and San Jose, but it probably won't now be until 2026. But absolutely, we want this to be seen, to be enjoyed and to give it more life and especially to give our dancers more opportunity to actually live in this moment. Yeah.

So if you want to see it, May 4th, everyone, that's your shot for this year. We've been talking about the Angel Island Immigration Detention Center and the Oakland Ballet's new performance inspired by an Angel Island project does premiere on May 4th. You can get tickets. We've been joined by Graham Lustig, who is artistic director of the project and also the Oakland Ballet Company. Thanks for joining us. Thank you.

We've been joined by Phil Chan, choreographer on the Angel Island Project and co-founder of Final Bow for Yellow Face. Thank you, Phil. Thank you. We have been joined by Feng Ye, who has been enduring my pronunciation of her name. Thank you so much. She's choreographer on the Angel Island Project. Thank you, Yi. Thank you so much. And we have been joined by Ed Tepporn, who is executive director of the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation. Thank you, Ed. Thank you very much.

Earlier, we spoke with Nico Fisher, returning with us here on Forum. He's a junior at Santa Clara High School. We also spoke with his co-producer on this show, Maite Del Real, who is a junior at Ruth Asawa SF School of the Arts. Thank you so much to both of them. They produced this program as part of KQED's Youth Takeover Week program.

Thanks to youth takeover mentor and real hero of the forum team, Jericho Reiniger. Thank you so much. I'm Alexis Madrigal. Stay tuned for another hour of Forum Ahead with Mina Kim.

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