William T. Vollmann's Fukushima Testimony Published by Tristram

William T. Vollmann's book "Fukushima. Dans la zone interdite" has been published by Tristram. The work examines how an event like the March 2011 earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear disaster in Japan can become the argument of an artwork rather than its subject or backdrop. Vollmann traveled to Japan in April 2011, one month after the catastrophe, to bear witness. His account avoids explanation or heroism, focusing instead on the desolation of the landscape, the invisible radioactive contamination measured in becquerels, sieverts, and millirems, and encounters at the edge of the exclusion zone. The text draws parallels to Gerhard Richter's "September" and Steve Reich's "WTC 9/11," both constructed from the World Trade Center attacks, suggesting that Vollmann treats the Fukushima disaster as a witness by inscribing it in a series. Christophe Kihm provides commentary on the book.