The Dr. Jerry Hiura Next Gen Visual Artist Award honors Dr. Jerry’s passions through a scholarship that celebrates young visionary artists and supports their artistic practice and goals as they pursue higher education. This year’s theme is Embracing Identity.
Unleash your artistic voice and celebrate the power of Embracing Identity! Through visuals, express the beauty and complexities of your true self. Dive into the depths of your passions, culture, and experiences. Create an artwork that captures the essence of who you are and inspires others to embrace their own unique identities. Open to all Santa Clara County high school students. Visit sjmusart.org/nextgen on how to enter or learn more.
Meet the Jurors
From left to right: Cynthia Cao, Lotte Van de Walle, and Vanessa Hatakeyama. Images courtesy of the jurors.
Cynthia Cao
Cynthia Cao is a visual artist working primarily with printmaking and photography. She has a decade of experience working as an exhibition designer and arts educator in the Bay Area. She has worked as the Exhibition Designer for Chopsticks Alley Art since 2018, and collaborated on projects ART-ventures in Contemporary Art and Taste of Home, two projects to engage local communities in the arts. As the Art Program Coordinator for the San José Office of Cultural Affairs, she manages mural projects for the public art program. Cao earned an BFA in Pictorial Arts and a Minor in Art History from San Jose State University.
Lotte Van De Walle
Lotte Van De Walle is a Belgian painter and illustrator who moved to California in 2017. Her experience as an art teacher and illustrator of children’s books taught her the importance of curiosity, and she is intrigued by our visual memory and the different narratives it evokes. She has been a Let’s Look at Art docent from the San José Museum of Art since 2019. You can view her art at lottevandewalle.com.
About LLAA
Lets Look at Art is an award-winning volunteer outreach organization provides free classroom art presentations to over 30,000 students yearly at culturally diverse schools throughout Santa Clara County. Let’s Look at Art has served more than 1 million students since 1972, and the docents of this program continue to inspire students to love art by actively engaging them and helping them articulate their ideas and use their critical thinking skills.
Vanessa Hatakeyama
Bay Area-born and raised, Vanessa Hatakeyama is the Acting Museum Director of the Japanese American Museum of San Jose (JAMsj) and serves on the Board of Directors for the Japantown Community Congress of San Jose (JCCsj). A San José Japantown resident for over a decade, Vanessa is deeply rooted in the local community and has fostered collaborations with artists and arts organizations to showcase and celebrate the vibrant creativity, abundant diversity, and rich cultures that thrive in the historic Japantown neighborhood.
As committed to her work and community endeavors as she is, they all come second to her beautiful blended and extended family and her passion for the Hawaiian art of Hula. When she has free time she is an avid listener of podcasts, reader of books, writer of poetry and prose, and enjoys throwing inconsistently shaped mugs, bowls, and plates on the pottery wheel.
About JAMsj
Located in the heart of San Jose Japantown, the Japanese American Museum of San Jose (JAMsj), has served the public since 1987, advancing our mission to collect, preserve and share Japanese American history, art and culture through our permanent gallery, rotating exhibits, programs and educational tours. Learn more at www.jamsj.org.