Challenge

Four Freedoms Park on Roosevelt Island celebrates FDR’s 1941 speech on universal freedoms. Yet thirteen months later, Roosevelt’s anti-Japanese policies forced Japanese Americans into relocation centers. My great-uncle, Masao Limuro, spent seven years imprisoned without trial under these policies. Roosevelt Island itself once housed prisons.

How could I acknowledge this erased history without creating a hopeless piece? How could the site hold both its celebrated ideals and suppressed contradictions?

Approach

I invited 80 participants to hang Japanese wind chimes (furin) and write how they advance freedom today—shifting from past injustice to present action. The collective sound became the soundtrack for a spoken word performance exploring our non-linear pursuit of freedom.

In my wind chime, I hid one of the intercepted letters used to imprison my great-uncle.

Impact

Freedom Furin raised awareness of erased history—many participants, including Park staff, were unaware of Roosevelt’s anti-Japanese policies and their connection to the site. Rather than memorializing suffering, it activated the site for ongoing freedom work. The soundscape—created by many voices—embodied the collaborative nature of liberation.

The installation demonstrated how participatory art can hold complexity: honoring painful history while refusing to let it define the present.