‘Permanence’ explores tattoo culture, history
Scott Iwasaki, Deseret Morning News March 7, 2008 A lot of rock musicians—good and bad, talented and worthless—have tattoos. When I was growing up, tattoos were considered slightly dangerous and only a few people had them. Throughout the years, some of my friends, my stepsister and other family members have decided to get “inked.” Their…
Book Review: Permanence
Jen Cray, Ink19 Magazine March 2008 In an age where 18-year-old kids have already acquired full sleeves and tattoo shops are as common as Starbucks, Kip Fulbeck is attempting to re-examine what it is about the art of ink on skin that attracts such a vast array of people. The book’s concept is a simple…
Kip Fulbeck Interview
Frank Agostinelli, asiansofmixedrace.com March 1, 2008 If you have had the pleasure of meeting Kip Fulbeck, you’ll agree when I say he is one the nicest and most genuine people you will ever meet. Besides being arguably the most recognizable face in the Hapa community, he is an award-winning artist, slam poet and filmmaker. And…
Kip Fulbeck – The face of hapa
Melanie Colburn, Hyphen Magazine Winter 2007/2008 WHO BETTER to be our Hybrid issue cover centaur-the mythical half-man, half horse-than writer, filmmaker, musician, professor and all-around thought-provoker Kip Fulbeck. Along with his Cantonese, English, Irish and Welsh background, Fulbeck represents what we were aiming for with our Hybrid issue: A multidisciplinary approach to life. While working…
The Hapa Project: How multiracial identity crosses oceans
Alana Folen and Tina Ng, UH Today Spring, 2007 Hawai’i – often overlooked as nothing more than a scenic paradise – recently started to live up to its “melting pot” reputation when a U.S. senator representing Illinois formally announced his presidential candidacy. With personal ties to Hawai’i, Sen. Barack Obama inadvertently put Hawai’i in the…
So What Are You? JANM Show Questions Identities and Seeks to Demystify the Term ‘Hapa’
Tami Mnoian, Los Angeles Downtown News December 14, 2006 I’m not saying this is the end-all-be-all of experiencing hapa,” artist Kip Fulbeck announces. “This is my experience.” Fulbeck is sitting in a low-key Santa Barbara coffee shop as he makes this statement, but his words resonate to Downtown Los Angeles and beyond. His current project,…
Mixed-Race Asians Find Pride as Hapas
Teresa Watanabe, Los Angeles Times June 11, 2006 A new book and an art exhibit in L.A. reflect an evolution in perceptions of a multiracial group historically made to feel like outsiders. In Chinese restaurants, he was the kid who was always given the fork. In his largely white Covina public schools, he was the…
We Are Hapa
Gwen Muranaka, The Rafu Shimpo June 10, 2006 New photo exhibit at JANM explores ideas of identity and ethnicity. Photographs of individuals of multiracial heritage and their responses to the most common question asked of people of mixed-race background—”What are you?”—comprises the heart of the art exhibition, “kip fulbeck: part asian, 100% hapa,” set to…
Not what you are but who you are
Cynthia Dea, Los Angeles Times June 8, 2006 As a kid, Kip Fulbeck found it almost impossible to fit in because of his ethnic background: His mother is Cantonese; his father is English and Irish. Strangers thought it perfectly appropriate to ask, “What are you?” It’s a question he still encounters, but he’s channeled it…
Hapa Nation
Valerie Takahama, Orange County Register May 29, 2006 When Ken Radomski was in Japan a couple of years ago, he got a kick out of the little kids who spotted his mohawk, thought of British soccer star David Beckham and shouted, “Beckham! Beckham!” at him. The lanky Southern California teenager had a little fun of…
Book Review: Part Asian, 100% Hapa
Frank Y. Pak Agostinelli, asiansofmixedrace.com May 25, 2006 Back in the 80s, the shoe company Converse unleashed a line known as The Weapon. The shoe was pushed by this triad of NBA stars; Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, and “Dr. J” Julius Erving. In one of the commercials, Magic Johnson emphatically states in a voice so…
A Hapa Project: Identity, Outside the Color Lines
Victoria Kraus, Asiance Magazine May 20, 2006 “I am exactly the same as every other person in 2500.” So says a handwritten response to photographer Kip Fulbeck’s question to mixed Asian hapas, “What are you?” The Hapa Project is a collection of collarbone-and-above photographs of ethnically mixed Asians by artist Kip Fulbeck at the Japanese…
The Pursuit of Hapa-ness
Jeff Yang, sfgate.com March 30, 2006 A growing percentage of the Asian American population can trace their lineage to two or more races. In his new book, “Part Asian, 100% Hapa,” artist and author Kip Fulbeck explores multiracial Asian America through hundreds of hapa quotes and portraits. What does hapa identity mean for the future…
Review: Kip Fulbeck’s acclaimed fictional autobiography
Mandy Willingham, eurasionnation.com July, 2002 In his first full-length published work, Paper Bullets: A Fictional Autobiography (University of Washington Press 2001), award-winning Chinese-Caucasian performer, artist, professor and author Kip Fulbeck explores the effects of stereotypical depictions and perceptions of Asians, particularly those perpetuated by the American media. Through a series of hilarious, aggressive and poignant…
‘Bullets’ insights are right on target
Yoko Kuramoto-Eidsmoe, The Seattle Times October 14, 2001 The thing that will make people pick up Kip Fulbeck’s Paper Bullets is that it’s about a guy who grows up hapa (half-Asian) in America. But that won’t be what leaves the deepest impression. What stays with you is his startling honesty and dead-on observations. The California…
Artist Profile – Kip Fulbeck
Victoria Namkung, MAVIN Magazine July 10, 2001 What do you do when you’re already an accomplished teacher, performance artist and filmmaker? Kip FUlbeck, 35, decided to write his first novel. Paper Bullets, which has just debuted (University of Washington Press), is a fictional autobiography about a multiracial Aisan-American male living in Southern California. By the…
An Interview with Kip Fulbeck – Going Ballistic
By Oliver Wang, asianavenue.com June 22, 2001 Kip Fulbeck’s plants his feet in a jigsaw world. At any given moment, he can be an artist/academic/author/actor/auteur/lifeguard (yes, lifeguard). Now a professor at UC Santa Barbara, Fulbeck first came to prominence with a series of film shorts focusing on everything from hapa identity (Banana Split) to interracial…
The Kip Club
Terry Hong, A. Magazine June/July 2001 Kip Fulbeck is not your average performance artist. At age 35, he’s a tenured professor at UC Santa Barbara, does outreach programs for at-risk kids, was a nationally ranked swimmer and even ferries bugs outside instead of brutally squashing them. Most recently, he published his first book, Paper Bullets:…
Hip Hapa
Soyon Im, Seattle Weekly June 7 – 13, 2001 WHAT DO YOU remember when you hear Morrissey sing, “Take me out tonight, where there’s music and there’s people who are young and alive”? For 36-year-old Kip Fulbeck, a professor of art at UC-Santa Barbara, that melancholy tune signifies the loss of his first love. At…
Book Review: Paper Bullets
Eric Lister, Artsweek May 31, 2001 Kip Fulbeck is fluent in the language of pop culture. It is a vocabulary of songs everyone in a graduating high school class knows by heart and the handful of advertising campaigns that creep into homes as plush toys or prime time television movies. It is the collective voice…