I originally found this YouTube video below at this article; “Time Lapse Map of Every Nuclear Explosion Ever On Earth.” Personally, I have my doubts about the public knowing about “every” test conducted. But setting aside that cynical belief, the video is disturbing none the less for the possibility of the number of tests being understates.

According to Josip Šulj, whom posted it on YouTube, the video is from Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto.

Josip Šulj writes:

Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto has created a beautiful, undeniably scary time-lapse map of the 2053 nuclear explosions which have taken place between 1945 and 1998, beginning with the Manhattan Project’s “Trinity” test near Los Alamos and concluding with Pakistan’s nuclear tests in May of 1998. This leaves out North Korea’s two alleged nuclear tests in this past decade (the legitimacy of both of which is not 100% clear).

Each nation gets a blip and a flashing dot on the map whenever they detonate a nuclear weapon, with a running tally kept on the top and bottom bars of the screen. Hashimoto, who began the project in 2003, says that he created it with the goal of showing”the fear and folly of nuclear weapons.” It starts really slow — if you want to see real action, skip ahead to 1962 or so — but the buildup becomes overwhelming.

“Time Lapse Map of Every Nuclear Explosion Ever On Earth”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9U8CZAKSsNA

There is another version of the same video here on the CTBTO Preparatory Commission website.

According to the information listed there, Isao Hashimoto is:

Profile of the artist: Isao HASHIMOTO

Born in Kumamoto prefecture, Japan in 1959.

Worked for 17 years in financial industry as a foreign exchange dealer. Studied at Department of Arts, Policy and Management of Musashino Art University, Tokyo.

Currently working for Lalique Museum, Hakone, Japan as a curator.

Created artwork series expressing, in the artist’s view, “the fear and the folly of nuclear weapons”:

“1945-1998” © 2003
“Overkilled”
“The Names of Experiments”

About “1945-1998” ©2003

“This piece of work is a bird’s eye view of the history by scaling down a month length of time into one second. No letter is used for equal messaging to all viewers without language barrier. The blinking light, sound and the numbers on the world map show when, where and how many experiments each country have conducted. I created this work for the means of an interface to the people who are yet to know of the extremely grave, but present problem of the world.”
Contact the artist:

Should you have any query regarding this artwork, please contact e-mail address below:

hashi123@amy.hi-ho.ne.jp

* The number excludes the announced nuclear tests by North Korea.