Artist explores radioactive commonality between Japanese and American citizens

Jan. 28—To see the future, we must first look into the past.

This is true for the entire history of the Front Range corridor and the greater Western United States.

The region was once the country's primary source of uranium and plutonium mining throughout the Cold War. But plants and manufacturers that worked to fuel the nuclear race eventually collapsed, and places like Jeffrey City were rendered ghost towns; sites like Rocky Flats, Colorado, transformed into a National Wildlife Refuge.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki might be the first and only practical application of combative nuclear weaponry in world history, but the effects of radioactive fallout extend beyond that which was experienced by Japanese citizens following the use of the bombs nicknamed Little Boy and Fat Man.

But these victims, referred to as Hibakusha, are not alone in their victimization.

"Even though I talk about nuclear issues, I'm starting to think in a way that my focus happens to be nuclear issues because my heritage is exactly that," acclaimed Baltimore-based artist Kei Ito said. "I think about war and peace a lot. When you think about it, the peace we are living right now is always achieved by the sacrifice of others."

Similar after-effects to radioactive fallout — generational cancer and abnormalities — were experienced by residents of the American West. They were labeled with a lesser-known classification known as downwinders, referring to those who had lived in proximity to the radioactive fallout of countless nuclear tests conducted by the U.S. government over a 50-year period.

"Fallout" can refer to more than the physical repercussions of chemical warfare. The use of nuclear weaponry inevitably results in a damaging societal fallout, one that we can still observe today in rising nuclear tensions between world superpowers.

In an abstract example, we can observe the slow ticking of the "Doomsday Clock," recently repositioned to 90 seconds to midnight — the closest the "clock" ever been to a predicted "doomsday."

There's a question as to whether Americans can accept this reality, and the recent installation, "The Beginning, in the land around me," by Ito, forces visitors to consider the consequences we all endure due to the institution of nuclear weaponry.

"The victims were not just Japanese, but American," Ito said. "Use of the nuclear weapon as a weapon, the victim was obviously the Japanese people. But so many sacrifices were made to even make the bomb.

"To me, that is mind-blowing and such a waste of life."

While the harmful effects of radiation were more directly experienced by Japanese citizens in 1945, including Ito's grandfather, many downwinders did not know that these nuclear bombs were spawning life-altering radioactive clouds from the Nevada Test Site — clouds that then drifted across the country.

"I think about this invisible trauma, radiation as an invisible trauma that my grandfather experienced," Ito said. "I witnessed the radiation manifest as a cancer for my grandfather, and he passed away when I was 9.

"That's the kind of the issue that downwinders face, as well. People don't recognize the illness or the things that might have been taken away by the bomb with a lack of information and lack of proper legal warning by the government. Unfortunately, they're still fighting for even the basic health care, but there's no recovering from it."

Almost immediately following nuclear tests, realizations as to the effects of the fallout came when Japanese camera company Kodak discovered that radiation was "clouding" their film during distribution. It wasn't that the film was produced in proximity to the original New Mexico testing site, but that the nuclear cloud had drifted 2,000 miles up to Indiana, where the packaging material for shipping film sheets was manufactured.

One of the most visually grabbing installations in Ito's exhibit in the Gregory Allicar Museum of Art at Colorado State University is a display of 108 overexposed film negatives. The piece, titled "Eye Who Witnessed," is a compilation of archival photographs — half of them being the eyes of Hibakusha, the other half downwinders.

The entirety of the exhibit spawned from this piece, as Ito decided to explore the link between those who suffered from the bomb in Hiroshima and those Americans who helped create the bomb. One eye is indistinguishable from another, including the eye of his grandfather, which he included in the piece, as well.

"Most of the people think it's a Hiroshima thing, it's a World War II thing," Ito said. "If you dissect and look into the history, from the mining of the uranium and plutonium to the testing conducted in New Mexico and all the people who are exposed to it, many people were exposed to the radiation during the creation of the bomb.

"That legacy continues through the Cold War until today."

It may not be common knowledge, but the United States tested more than 1,000 nuclear bombs between July 1945 and September 1992, concluding with the testing of a 20-kiloton explosive. This prolific number of tests — the most ever conducted by a single country — is pointedly represented in the installation directly across the room from "Eye Who Witnessed."

A set of scrolls, divided by five minutes of footage from U.S. nuclear tests, displays our country's entire nuclear testing log. At the height of nuclear tests in the 1960s and '70s, multiple bombs were detonated each day, with as many as 10 nuclear detonations occurring in a single month.

Other pieces in the exhibit explore similar ideas, like "R_st In Peace," a deconstruction of the bomb "Little Boy" down to almost exact dimensions.

The paint that Ito applied directly to the wall, normally a flat black hue, contains particles of metal. He then sprayed the paint with hydrogen peroxide. So, rather than simply depicting the coloration of rusting metal, the piece actually is rusting, and will continue to do so as the exhibit remains in place.

"I'm trying to portray the containment, trying to create this coffin, this box that's rusting away so people will never use (these weapons) again," he said.

In the center of the room, a ground installation addresses the natural remedies that were used by Hibakusha in place of medical supplies to ease the pain of radiation burns. Honey and various vegetable oils were smeared over photographic prints of Earth scorched by the heat of a nuclear blast. The rocks placed upon the prints Ito collected from Rocky Flat.

"The land around me" is an analysis of how every individual, regardless of nationality, is affected by the use of nuclear weapons. However, at its core, the exhibit also is a personal statement, where Ito toils with his heritage and connection to the bomb.

No artwork in the installation more plainly explores this than a row of 20mm anti-aircraft rounds lining the northern wall of the show. Though simple, "(Un)premeditated Inheritance" is likely the most personal statement in the room.

At the height of World War II, Ito's grandfather, 15 years old at the time, contributed to the Japanese war effort by assembling similar anti-aircraft rounds at the ammunition factory in Hiroshima. The bullets on display have been hollowed out and, in place of gunpowder, have been filled with finely ground fibers of Ito's hair.

The grounds of hair have been cut with trinitite, the element discovered following the first test of a nuclear weapon in Alamogordo, New Mexico. It is the name for the residue created after a nuclear explosion — several times hotter than the center of the sun — flash-melts the sand on the desert floor into glass.

By combining the two materials, Ito has literally woven the history of nuclear weaponry and his own heritage into one vessel. He and trinities are both products of nuclear warfare.

"Ito often wonders what the consequences would be if the bullets made by his grandfather, or many others like him, took down the Enola Gay; the complete erase of Ito's own existence," the installation's plaque reads. "Conversely, Hiroshima and its populace would not have been decimated and our inherited radioactive trauma would not be passed down through the generations."

Part of the piece addresses the fact that many individuals become a slave to the "war machine," whether they desire involvement or not. It also serves as the keystone of "the land around me," leaving Ito to contemplate his existence and the balance of life as created by war and peace.

"I talk a lot about victimhood, but victimhood is also a many-sided thing," Ito said. "Nothing is really black and white, but it's always in the gray. What we can learn from and how we can move on is learning from the past and trying to redeem ourselves.

"I think that's what my grandfather did in a way."

Will Carpenter is the Wyoming Tribune Eagle's Arts and Entertainment/Features Reporter. He can be reached by email at wcarpenter@wyomingnews.com or by phone at 307-633-3135. Follow him on Twitter @will_carp_.