From the Street to the World: Legacies of the Import Car Scene
A related program of Cruising J-Town exhibition by Japanese American National Museum (JANM) and ArtCenter College of Design
Saturday, August 30, 2025
2 p.m.–3:30 p.m. PDT
Japanese American National Museum
Democracy Center
100 North Central Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90012
Dive into the world of import tuners with a panel discussion about the roots of the import car scene, beginning with its earliest emergence in the 1970s through the explosion of interest in the 1980s through 2000s.
Cruising J-Town exhibition curator Oliver Wang will be in conversation with a range of panelists including Robert Jung, founding member of the Nikkei racing club Westside Racing Association; Tim Mochizuki, a member of the early 1980s Gardena racing club, KMA, who went onto work at Toyota Racing Development and Toyota Sales; Tod Kaneko, a contemporary of Mochizuki who was heavily involved as an import tuner and has been a longtime engineer at Mazda; Ed Loh, head of editorial at the MotorTrend Group with personal roots in the import scene of the 1990s; and Terry Yamaguchi, cofounder of the Japanese Classic Car Show, now in its twentieth year.
AUDIO: Listen to Tod Kaneko talk about his passion of customizing his Datsun 510 and Tim Mochizuki talk about people getting ready to cruise Nisei Week in JANM’s Cruising J-Town Audio Tour.
