Diorama of Manzanar Concentration Camp, 1986. In 1982 Lance Matsushita conceived of the idea for a model that would both bear witness and pay tribute to the experiences of Japanese Americans incarcerated during World War II. On a pilgrimage to Manzanar concentration camp, Matsushita had noted that little physical evidence remained of the thousands of people, including his grandmother, who had been forced to carry out their lives behind barbed wire. Through building this scale diorama of Manzanar, Matsushita recovered and presented in immediate, physical terms the massive toll of the incarceration of Japanese Americans.