What is the Fukuryu Maru?

The twenty-three crewmen of a Japanese fishing vessel Daigo Fukuryu Maru - translated in English as The Lucky Dragon No. 5 - at approximately 4:00 a.m., on March 1, 1954, witnessed the detonation of the Bravo Hydrogen Bomb Test in the Bikini Atoll. The test blast was 750 times greater than the detonation over Hiroshima. The Bravo blast remains the largest nuclear weapon ever detonated by the United States. The flash of light from the blast was reportedly seen as far away as Okinawa. Two hundred thirty-nine indigenous Bikini Atoll inhabitants would suffer the consequences of fallout; 46 would die within the succeeding twelve years due to complications deriving from their exposure to radioactive fallout. Twenty-eight American meteorological observers, and the already mentioned, 23 crewmen of a Japanese fishing vessel - the Daigo Fukuryu Maru - would endure much the same fate. One of the Japanese crewmen, Aikichi Kuboyama, the chief wireless operator of the vessel, would die several months following his return due to radiation illness. The Fukuryu Maru is exhibited in Tokyo.

Collapsing Histories is participating in the marking of the 50th anniversary of the Fukuryu Maru incident. Previously Collapsing Histories was exhibited in California galleries, however, this is by far the most important exhibition of the show, because the venues themselves are as important to the concept of the show as the work in it.