Indigo grass project aims at reviving unattended farmland in southwestern Japan

March 28, 2022

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Indigo grass project aims at reviving unattended farmland in southwestern Japan

Cute mechanical toys give time of peace to Japanese amid continued pandemic

 February 28, 2022

Cute mechanical toys give time of peace to Japanese amid continued pandemic 

The small art museum located in Fukuoka Prefecture, southwestern Japan, used to be a guesthouse for a local sake Japanese rice wine brewer. Currently owned by Okawa City, the facility usually displays its collection of paintings and other art works, but it has become an exhibition theater for cute mechanical toys, some of them mysterious.

The two-story, semi-Western style building was completed by Seiriki sake brewer in 1908. It was used as a privately run art museum from the 1950s, and then, it was donated in 1996 to the city, which reopened it for citizens after renovation in 2001.

As the event comes amid the covid-19 pandemic, visitors are asked to register their name and mobile phone number at the entrance so that if a virus infection is found there, they may be so informed any time soon. This kind of measure has been taken by public facility operators throughout Japan since just after the start of the pandemic. 

Visitors also have their temperature checked at the entrance. After using a hand disinfector, they receive a pair of thin plastic gloves from the staff. 

They can touch and move the toys and other objects displayed with their gloves. When the toy's handle is turned around or the button is pressed, some objects start playing mysterious music and sound. 

This enables visitors to forget their hard days from early 2020 with the virus and refresh themselves for a while. 

The latest event, held at Owaka City Seiriki Art Museum from early January to late February, displays about 80 pieces of work crafted by five artists. The largest part of them are built by a local architect-turned mechanical toy maker. 

His pieces feature witches, fairies, rabbits and other creatures, as well as working figures like a baker and a woodcutter. 

Okawa City has been known as a hub of woodworking plants, which produce mainly furniture.

Based on its tradition of woodworking, the city aims at spreading enjoyable wood crafting among citizens and other people, not just adults but also children, a receptionist said. "We have organized the exhibition to demonstrate the fun of woodworking to many people" while taking anti-infection measures, she said. 

Big straw hen hoped to herald end of anti-pandemic fight

January 28, 2022

Big straw hen hoped to herald end of anti-pandemic fight 

The huge object appeared at a park in Chikuzen Town, Fukuoka Prefecture, southwestern Japan, early in December, amid local people's hope that the covid-19 pandemic will subside soon so that the affected people's griefs will come to an end around the world.

The 8-meter-high straw hen is a product by young volunteers who have gathered for a project to build a monument for each year to cheer up the largely rural community.

Chikuzen Town is known as a hub of egg farms in the region. This is why the hen has been selected as the theme for the straw monument project this time. 

The objects built so far since 2015 include a wild boar and a gorilla. 

The straw hen has a total length of 6 meters and weighs about 3 tons.  Lying beneath its body is an egg from which a chick has just appeared. 

The project has been organized by a local youth group, and the straw hen is a product of two months of work by about 150 volunteers, with bunches of straws collected from the rice fields around after the harvest.

The hen is known as a bird which heralds the dawn in Japan. In order for a chick to be born, the mother bird and the chick work together by picking at the eggshell from the outside and from the inside of the shell simultaneously, organizers say in a message on the board put near the object. 

"This can be interpreted to mean that we must close our ranks to overcome the covid-19 pandemic." 

The straw monument project is supported by crowd funding from across the country.  

The big hen will be displayed until the end of January, and spectators could see its night view lit up on some days from late December to early January.  

Visitors are asked to see the object while wearing a face mask and keeping a social distance from each other.

The series of new daily customs for living with the new coronavirus has come to stay among Japanese people. 

At a time when many people in Japan are getting exhausted with continuing the new practices in their daily life, the big hen is hoped to help boost their spirits and bring their normal days back to them soon.