Uncoiling: A Japanese-American Family's History is a 27-page family immigration story distilled from the writings of Yoko Oji Kikuchi’s great-grandmother Shizuko Kikuchi, great-uncle Charles Kikuchi (author of The Kikuchi Diary, University of Illinois Press, 1973) and great-aunt Alice Kikuchi Hiromura.
This comic was workshopped and illustrated between January and July 2025 through the Portfolio Program at the Independent Publishing Resource Center in Portland, OR, risograph printed in fluorescent pink and teal ink, and officially released at Short Run Comix Festival in November 2025.
Part talk-show interview where Yoko interviews her deceased ancestors, part adventure storytelling based on what she learns from these relatives, the story centers mainly on her great-grandparents' immigration to California between 1905 and 1913, and the ensuing chaos. Some themes include banishment, transgenerational storytelling, family trauma and healing.
Yoko plans to begin a second installment in 2026 based around the incarceration of her family at Gila River Camp in Arizona during World War II, as well as make a pilgrimage with her family this November to Hachijo-jima, the ancestral island where her great-grandfather was raised (that was previously a penal colony from 1606-1868).
Release date 11/01/2025.
Size: 7.25” x 10.5”
Printed at Reed College with help from APANO, PDX, in teal and fluorescent pink on cream paper.
Stapled and bound at IPRC
Released 1 November 2025.
Uncoiling: A Japanese-American Family's History is a 27-page family immigration story distilled from the writings of Yoko Oji Kikuchi’s great-grandmother Shizuko Kikuchi, great-uncle Charles Kikuchi (author of The Kikuchi Diary, University of Illinois Press, 1973) and great-aunt Alice Kikuchi Hiromura.
This comic was workshopped and illustrated between January and July 2025 through the Portfolio Program at the Independent Publishing Resource Center in Portland, OR, risograph printed in fluorescent pink and teal ink, and officially released at Short Run Comix Festival in November 2025.
Part talk-show interview where Yoko interviews her deceased ancestors, part adventure storytelling based on what she learns from these relatives, the story centers mainly on her great-grandparents' immigration to California between 1905 and 1913, and the ensuing chaos. Some themes include banishment, transgenerational storytelling, family trauma and healing.
Yoko plans to begin a second installment in 2026 based around the incarceration of her family at Gila River Camp in Arizona during World War II, as well as make a pilgrimage with her family this November to Hachijo-jima, the ancestral island where her great-grandfather was raised (that was previously a penal colony from 1606-1868).
Release date 11/01/2025.
Size: 7.25” x 10.5”
Printed at Reed College with help from APANO, PDX, in teal and fluorescent pink on cream paper.
Stapled and bound at IPRC
Released 1 November 2025.
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