Decision to Remove Yonobe Kenji’s ‘Sun Child’

The work titled ‘Sun Child’, a 6.2-meter-tall sculpture, by contemporary artist, YANOBE Kenji, was installed in front of the Komu Komu educational and cultural complex in Fukushima City. Since its unveiling on August 3, it was put in the center of criticism. In response to backlash, Mayor KOHAYA Hiroshi announced at a press conference on August 28 that the city decided to remove the sculpture. The work, a standing statue of a child wearing a hazmat suit, was created in 2011 in the wake of the Great East Japan Earthquake and was intended to express hope and a world free from nuclear disasters, but it was being criticized one after another for promoting harmful rumors about the disaster at TEPCO’s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plan, leading to its removal. With the artist’s agreement, the sculpture was removed from September 18. (Japanese)