Praying and cursing polluters to death – We Make Money Not Art

Mitsutoshi Hanaga Collective of Monks Praying to Kill House owners of Companies Accountable for Environmental Pollution at the Suzuka River in Yokkaichi, 1970. Image: Mitsutoshi Hanaga Estate

In the 1960s, air pollution in Japan prompted the distribute of deadly circumstances such as the Itai-itai condition and Yokkaichi asthma. In spite of scientific investigations, local politicians, bureaucrats and small business homeowners set revenue right before people’s overall health and poisonous industrial squander continued to be unveiled in the setting.

In 1970, a little team of Buddhist monks, exasperated with the absence of governmental intervention, decided to protest. They adopted the identify Jusatsu Kito Sodan (Team of Monks Bringing the Curse of Dying) and traveled to some of these contaminating industrial sites. Outfitted with conch devices and publications of curses and incantations, the monks formed a procession, drumming, chanting, praying, and performed ceremonies with the aim of cursing factory proprietors to death.

Hokkaichi bronchial asthma sufferer. Image: Mitsutoshi Hanaga estate

Jusatsu Kito Sodan rituals in motion, 1970. Photo: Mitsutoshi Hanaga estate

Jounalist, reporter and photographer Mitsutoshi Hanaga followed their campaign to doc this early example of anti-corporate and anti-authorities activism.

Jusatsu Kito Sodan fought for spiritual and actual physical retaliation on behalf of the dead, and uncovered injustices in society. “The team challenged industrialists with counter-murder tries, lawfully thought of as an “impossible crime” that could not be prosecuted in their judiciary procedure.” (by using)

I learned this intervention although browsing Emergency Exit, curated by Ana Mizerit, Bojana Piškur, Zdenka Badovinac and Igor Španjol, at +MSUM in Ljubljana. The present continues to be open until eventually 11 September 2022