Ruth Asawa at a reception held in her honor at San Francisco City Hall last year.

Photo by J.K. Yamamoto

One of Asawa’s best-known works, the Andrea Mermaid Fountain (1968) in San Francisco’s Ghirardelli Square. Cast bronze, 16 feet in diameter and 5 feet high.

SANTA ROSA — “Following Nature: Ruth Asawa in Sonoma County” is running until April 20 at the Sonoma County Museum, 425 7th St.

“The Sonoma County museum is delighted to present for the first time in the museum’s history, drawings, paintings, and sculpture by one of America’s most important women artists of the 20th century, Ruth Asawa,” said a spokesperson for the museum

“Like many artists over the last century who have sought refuge in Sonoma County for inspiration, Asawa spent over 30 years observing nature and immersing herself in organic forms along the Russian River near Armstrong Woods.

“Asawa’s artwork has been collected by such important institutions as: Solomon Guggenheim Museum, Whitney Museum of American Art, Oakland Museum of California, and the M.H. de Young Memorial Museum, among many others.

“Her contributions to the modern art movement, which she has actively participated in since the 1950s, are substantial.

“A Japanese American who spent 18 months in internment camps at a young age, she went on to attend Black Mountain College, the famous experimental art school in North Carolina, where she was immersed in the avant-garde.

“The museum would especially like to thank Paul Lanier and his family, who graciously loaned their private collection for this exhibition. Paul is the youngest son of Ruth Asawa and Albert Lainer; a gifted artist in his own right who was a ceramics student of Marguerite Wildenhain’s at Pond Farm.”

Born Ruth Aiko Asawa on Jan. 24, 1926 in Norwalk, a farming community in Southern California, Asawa was the fourth of seven children of immigrant parents from Japan who made their living as truck farmers growing seasonal crops — strawberries, carrots, green onions, tomatoes.

After World War II broke out, Asawa was interned first at a temporary camp at Santa Anita Race Track, and then six months later was shipped by train to a camp in Rohwer, Ark., where she attended high school.

She attended Milwaukee State Teachers College and later decided to follow her passion for art, attending Black Mountain College. It was there that Asawa met her husband, an architecture and design student.

In 1949, they moved to San Francisco, where they were married and still reside today.

Asawa later received honorary degrees from Milwaukee State Teachers College, California College of Arts and Crafts, San Francisco Art Institute, and San Francisco State University when she was in her 70s.

A short walk from downtown Santa Rosa and historic Railroad Square, the museum is open Wednesday through Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Admission is $5 general, $2 for students and seniors (65 and over), and free for children under 12 and members.

For more information, call (707) 579-1500 or visit www.sonomacountymuseum.org.

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