My current art project is progressing on the hypothesis that, ‘only an acquisition of their rights by women can push us to abandon nuclear energy’.

Just after the Fukushima disaster, one article on the Internet caught my eyes. It regarded the discrimination faced by women in Fukushima since rumours that they lost the chances to bear healthy babies had spread. Actually, several women opted for an abortion in the aftermath of the disaster, mostly due to the unreliable information provided to them in Fukushima. This tragic story reminded me of the film ‘Black Rain’(1989), by Imamura Shohei (1926 – 2006), set in Hiroshima after the atomic bombing. In this film, the heroine, atom-bombed by the US forces, is repeatedly refused an engagement of marriage due to the rumour that ‘She was irradiated’. This kind of abject, unreasonable discrimination occurs still today, over sixty years after the war, but it concerns in particular women, which shows clearly the women’s position in contemporary Japan.

Simultaneously, I was shocked by the fact that following ongoing marginalisation of the victims, the Japanese government and above all, its people continued to sustain the peaceful use of nuclear energy. This is how I have formed a thesis: ‘only an acquisition of their rights by  (Japanese) women can push us to abandon nuclear energy’.

In this art project, I attempt to research on women’s positions in the world which prioritises economy more than life. I believe that the research project would be trigger reconsideration of our current world, which steps up its efforts to hold onto nuclear energy.

The research project would be carried out in all districts which suffered from radioactive contamination.