Asia

Kathy Jetñil-Kijiner

Anointed

2018

Anointed, 2018 (still)

Anointed by Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner and Dan Lin is a poem recital/video that addresses the American nuclear testing legacy in the Marshall Islands that occurred between 1946 to 1958 in Bikini and Enewetak Atolls. The artist’s words of resilience and healing are uttered as she travels across the northeastern atolls of her vast island nation. The climax of the short film takes place when the artist, holding white coral stones (a Marshallese funeral ritual) stands on top of the massive concrete dome erected on Runit Island in Enewetak Atoll to contain 73,000 square meters of radioactive waste—only a small fraction of the debris generated by the nuclear tests, the rest of which was never cleaned up. Today, scientific surveys have proven that this dome is leaking radioactive materials into the ocean. To this day, the Marshallese people are suffering the consequences of nuclear testing, through cancers and genetic illnesses caused by radiation, and irreversible damage to the ecosystem.

Kathy Jetñil-Kijiner is a poet, teacher and performance artist born in the Marshall Islands. Her poetry primarily focuses on cultural issues and threats faced by Micronesian people. These include American nuclear testing conducted in the Marshall Islands, militarism, the rising sea level as a result of climate change, forced migration, and economic adaptation. In 2014, she was chosen to address the UN Climate Summit in New York City. Her first book of poems, Iep Jaltok: Poems from a Marshallese Daughter, was published in 2017. Jetñil-Kijiner works across artistic disciplines with her poetry, often focusing on weaving, which underpins the traditional spiritual and social structure of Marshallese life.

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Kathy Jetñil-Kijiner Anointed

Kathy Jetñil-Kijiner

Anointed