nagasakibana in kunisaki peninsula, oita pref. is fun for everybody

It has the big blue sky, the placid ocean all around, seasonal flowers including canola and sunflower from which plant oil is being made, camping grounds, and above all outdoor art installations and a stimulating art museum. 

You can be there for two hours - please stay at least two hours - or more, even stay overnight in a cabin or a tent. It's good for everybody.

I went there because of art specifically installed there and appreciated both artworks and environment.

Though kunisaki peninsula has a lot to offer, nagasakibana is carefree and healthy and you do not need a lot of planning.

Their new establishment, an art museum named the Art Museum of Nature and Human Non-homogeneity is, though philosophical, can be good for families, too. 

Here's a one-minute introduction to the cape called nagasakibana, once abandoned farmland but now a beautiful resort filled with seasonal flowers.

what art can do to communities

Gormley's statue

 Now there are many art festivals all across Japan. Such festivals can be said to have started with the one in the north of Japan called ECHIGO TSUMARI Art Triennale that started in 2000, followed by the Setouchi International Art Festival or Seto-gei which has been a great success since 2010.

In 2014, the Kunisaki Peninsula Art Festival was celebrated and it left its traces in many places of the peninsula, enhancing the innate potential the places had had.

One of the assets the festival left is a symbolic iron-cast statue made by Antony Gormley. It stands in the middle of the old local religious center and when it was planned to be installed, people discussed if it would be appropriate to install a naked iron statue cast by the real body of the artist. 

But now, the statue looks philosophical if not religious. For some people, however, the statue seems to be equivalent to a Buddhist statue to which, naturally, they would like to offer small money just like they do at temples and shrines. 

It was a heck of a job to carry the 630-ton iron statue up the mountain, for which local professionals helped. The process already involved locals and that must be a great contribution by art already.

The statue has been exposed to the elements and has been aging. He showcases passing time specifically here in the Kunisaki Peninsula.

The 630-ton statue was wired up

up the mountain path

 

 on the way remains a pair of guards

more on the way and now the statue is down below 

money offered at the bottom of the statue

 cave-like hall for the deva king 

 down the mountain