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Yomiuri Shimbun
14-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yomiuri Shimbun
Kagawa: Another Art Museum Designed by Tadao Ando Opens on Naoshima Island; Features Artists from Asia
The Yomiuri Shimbun People enter Naoshima New Art Museum in the town of Naoshima in Kagawa Prefecture. NAOSHIMA, Kagawa — Naoshima New Art Museum, designed by world-renowned architect Tadao Ando, has recently opened on Naoshima Island in Kagawa Prefecture. Naoshima is known as an island of contemporary art. While there are many works by Western artists there, the new museum collects and exhibits works by artists from Asian countries and regions. The island is home to Chichu Art Musuem, which was also designed by Ando. The museum has become a popular tourist spot. The new museum is built on a hill. The exterior is designed to naturally blend in with local houses and the surrounding nature. The obtusely angled large roof looks as if it is an extension of the gentle curve of the hilltop. Black plaster is used for part of the walls, inspired by the burnt cedar walls of many houses in the neighborhood. The museum houses a cafe, too, from which visitors get a great view of the Seto Inland Sea. Naoshima New Art Museum's opening ceremony was held on May 31. Many tourists visited the museum immediately after it opened. 'There're so many exhibits, and they're very modern. I feel that time flows differently here,' said a woman in her 70s. The museum is open from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. daily and closed on Mondays (or Tuesday if Monday is a national holiday). The entrance fee is ¥1,500 if booked at the official booking site and ¥1,700 at the gate. Admission is free for children 15 or younger.
NDTV
12-06-2025
- NDTV
7 Must-Visit Hidden Gems In Japan You've (Probably) Never Heard Of
Explore Japan beyond the usual hotspots with these seven offbeat destinations: Naoshima's art, Kinosaki Onsen's hot springs, Tottori's sand dunes, Nagasaki's cultural blend, Aomori's apples, and more. Did our AI summary help? Let us know. When most people think of Japan, the big three always come up: Tokyo for its electric buzz, Kyoto for temples and teahouses, and Osaka for street food and neon nights. But Japan's real magic often lies in the spots that don't make it onto every itinerary. Away from the well-worn tourist trail, you'll find offbeat towns, islands, and villages that offer a more laid-back, intimate take on Japanese culture — with fewer crowds and way more charm. Here's a round-up of under-the-radar places in Japan that are worth putting on your wishlist. They're all accessible and ideal for a side trip or even a full escape from the mainstream. 1. Naoshima Tucked away in the Seto Inland Sea, Naoshima is a tiny island with massive creative energy. It's basically an outdoor museum with a beachy vibe. Picture Yayoi Kusama's polka-dotted pumpkins sitting by the water, sleek museums designed by Tadao Ando, and quirky art installations hidden around the island. The Benesse House doubles as both a museum and a hotel, so yes, you can literally sleep inside an art gallery. It's quiet, scenic, and totally unlike anywhere else in Japan. Getting there: Take a ferry from Uno Port (Okayama Prefecture). The nearest shinkansen stop is Okayama Station. 2. Kinosaki Onsen If you're up for a soak — and let's face it, Japan is the place for hot springs — Kinosaki Onsen in Hyogo Prefecture is your dream stop. This charming town has been welcoming bathers for over 1,300 years. Seven public bathhouses are scattered throughout the town, and visitors walk around in yukata robes from bath to bath. It's super photogenic with its willow-lined canals and low-key vibe. Bonus: The seafood here is stellar, especially the snow crab in winter. Getting there: About 2.5 hours by train from Kyoto or Osaka via the JR Limited Express Kinosaki. 3. Tottori Yes, Japan has actual sand dunes. Tottori, a sleepy prefecture along the Sea of Japan coast, is famous for its otherworldly landscape of rolling sand hills. You can ride camels, try sandboarding, or wander through the Sand Museum which features intricate sculptures carved entirely from — you guessed it — sand. Tottori is also the hometown of GeGeGe no Kitaro creator, Shigeru Mizuki, and the city of Sakaiminato has an entire street dedicated to his spooky manga characters. Getting there: Tottori City is reachable via limited express trains from Osaka (about 2.5 to 3 hours). 4. Shirakawa-go Nestled in the mountains of Gifu Prefecture, Shirakawa-go looks straight out of a storybook. The village is known for its gassho-zukuri farmhouses — traditional wooden homes with steep thatched roofs built to withstand heavy snow. Many of these buildings are centuries old, and some now serve as guesthouses where you can spend the night. Visit in winter when the whole place turns into a snowy dreamscape, lit up during special illumination events. Getting there: Best accessed by bus from Takayama or Kanazawa. 5. Nagasaki Photo: Unsplash Unlike much of Japan, Nagasaki has a unique mix of European and Asian influences. Its tragic past as the site of the second atomic bombing in 1945 is deeply honoured at the Peace Park and Atomic Bomb Museum, but the city also tells stories of resilience and cultural fusion. The Dutch-built Dejima island, Portuguese-influenced churches, and Chinatown all highlight its history as Japan's most international port. Getting there: Around 2 hours by train from Fukuoka's Hakata Station. 6. Aomori Photo: Pixabay Up in Japan's northernmost main island, Aomori is famous for its apples (some of the juiciest you'll ever eat), striking natural scenery, and one of the country's most visually insane festivals: Nebuta Matsuri. Held every August, it features massive illuminated floats, taiko drums, dancers, and fire. Outside of festival season, the nearby Hakkoda Mountains and Oirase Gorge offer lush hiking routes, especially stunning during autumn. Getting there: Take the shinkansen to Shin-Aomori Station from Tokyo (about 3 hours). 7. Yakushima This UNESCO World Heritage island in Kagoshima Prefecture is a haven for hikers and nature-lovers. It's covered in ancient cedar forests, some of which are over 7,000 years old. The most famous tree, Jomon Sugi, requires a full-day trek to reach, but the misty trails and mossy paths along the way make it totally worth it. Yakushima also inspired the forest scenes in Studio Ghibli's Princess Mononoke, which checks out once you're deep in the woods. Getting there: Fly or take a ferry from Kagoshima City.
AU Financial Review
05-06-2025
- General
- AU Financial Review
Millions have flocked to this billionaire's art islands
On a tree-dotted hill on Naoshima, an island in Japan's Seto Inland Sea, a museum was being completed, with construction equipment on hand and workers finishing their day. The Naoshima New Museum of Art opened last weekend. A concrete structure by Tadao Ando, it has a few unusual touches for a building by this Pritzker Prize-winning architect. There's a pebbly wall along the walkway to the entrance. To harmonise with the townscape, it has a black plaster exterior, exhibition spaces that are largely underground, and a single storey above, topped by a sloped metal roof. The iridescent sea is visible from the top floor.
Japan Times
05-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Japan Times
New Naoshima museum bets on Asia, not the West
A flight and a bus or several trains, a line, a boat, another line, a bus, a walk and 96 stairs is all it takes to get to Naoshima's newest art sanctum. Benesse Art Site Naoshima in the Seto Inland Sea, popularly shortened to just Naoshima or 'the art islands,' is a veritable art theme park of six museums and 22 spaces across four islands. Last week it welcomed a new member. The building, imaginatively named Naoshima New Museum of Art, opened May 31. Tadao Ando, Naoshima's inextricable architect, designed the space, making the museum his 10th contribution to the art site. Three floors of about 3,200 square meters of gallery begin at ground level and descend into the hill on which it rests. Architecturally the museum feels very much same-same as the rest of Naoshima, with a humble facade that looks out over the lesser-used Honmura port on the east side of the island. The staircase in the new Tadao Ando building creates a single line through the museum. | Thu-Huong Ha Unlike other Naoshima museums, whose collections are permanent, the new museum will change periodically, with the first update scheduled for February 2026. The new museum opens under the directorship of Akiko Miki with the exhibition 'From the Origin to the Future,' which contains installations and site-specific works by 12 living Asian artists. This is an important departure from the rest of Naoshima; the roster that's made it famous — Yayoi Kusama, Claude Monet, Walter De Maria, James Turrell, Hiroshi Sugimoto — skews heavily white and Japanese — although the new museum is consistent in that it's still predominantly male. The art site is jointly run by the Fukutake Foundation and Benesse Holdings, which were both founded by the Fukutake family. The vision for the art islands originally came from Tetsuhiko Fukutake, but when he unexpectedly died in 1986, his son, Soichiro, took over and presided over the island's cultural transformation over the next several decades. The billionaire publisher turns 80 this year, and the new museum, which draws from his collection, may well be his swan song. 'I started the Asian collection based on the hypothesis that the era of the West, of Europe and America, was coming to an end, and that an era of Asia would begin,' Fukutake told the press. 'And now, it feels like the times are actually heading in that direction, so I feel like it was the right decision.' Benesse signaled its commitment to the region in 2016, when it moved its ¥3 million Benesse Prize from its home at the Venice Biennale to the Singapore Biennale, with a new focus on Asian art. Works shown at the Naoshima New Museum of Art include past winners of the prize. Pannaphan Yodmanee, 'Aftermath' (2016/2025) and Henri Dono & indieguerillas, 'Consciousness of Humanity: a Journey to the Center' (2024-25) | Thu-Huong Ha Detail of Pannaphan Yodmanee, 'Aftermath' (2016/2025) | Thu-Huong Ha On the first floor, Southeast Asian artists make statements about religion, harmony, colonialism and memory. 'Aftermath' is an intricate and expansive mixed-media mural installation by Thai artist Pannaphan Yodmanee. The 11th Benesse Prize-winning work explores Buddhist cosmology using rocks and found objects. The artist paints traditional Thai art motifs directly onto stone and displays stupas below, while figures who seem straight out of Buddhist hell look on. Moving right across the mural, horse-backed Europeans shoot at loin-clothed natives in an endless cycle of suffering. Indonesian husband-and-wife pair indieguerillas, comprising Dyatmiko 'Miko' Bawono and Santi Ariestyowanti, collaborated with established Indonesian artist Heri Dono for seven pieces that make up the installation 'Consciousness of Humanity: a Journey to the Center.' Bright cartoon-like acrylics on wood draw on imagery from traditional Javanese puppet theater. The figurative illustrations were originally meant to be a public art work connecting a mosque and a church, says Bawono. But the commission didn't work out. '(The government) preferred a more neutral work with only shapes, like circles and triangles,' he says, adding that he's glad their vision could be executed on Naoshima. Do Ho Suh, 'Hub/s, Naoshima, Seoul, New York, Horsham, London, Berlin' (2025) | Thu-Huong Ha One floor down is a gallery containing Do Ho Suh's 'Hub,' an ongoing series that's brought the London-based Korean artist to global renown. Suh creates to-scale fabric and steel replicas of rooms and spaces he's lived in in Seoul, New York, Berlin, among others. For this iteration, he adds the hallway of a house from Naoshima, connecting it to previously made spaces. Though other works in this architectural series feature detailed fixtures like stoves, toilets and radiators, the ones here appear as one extended hallway, connecting place to place to place, smooth and nonspecific. On the lowest floor are three provocateurs of Japan's contemporary art world. Makoto Aida's newly commissioned 'Monument for Nothing — Red Torii Gate,' part of his ongoing project of the same name, critiques Japan and its leadership. A distorted torii gate sculpture looms over the space of the gallery, covered in low-res images collected from the news over the past three decades, a period in which Japan's economy has suffered and its birth rate has declined. The faces of Japanese politicians, with appearances by U.S. President Donald Trump and Steve Jobs, adorn the gate. One image shows former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wearing his infamous 'Abenomask,' while another shows him flanked by other former heads of government and cracking up. Thin sprouts rise up from all over the deformed figure, intended to represent hope for Japan's future — but they only manage to make the form look even more grotesque and diseased. Chim↑Pom from Smappa!Group, 'The Sweet Box: Michi in Transit' (2024-present) | Thu-Huong Ha The artist collective popularly known as Chim↑Pom shows elements from its Michi (as in, 'street') work in Tokyo's Koenji neighborhood, part of their 'Sukurappu ando Birudo' ('scrap and build') project. Documents, sofa parts, hoses, pipes and other debris from the demolitions of the former Parco building in Shibuya and Kabukicho Shopping District Promotion Association building are squashed into a box reminiscent of a shipping container, in a statement on Japan's constant construction and rebuilding. Stretching between the two works is Takashi Murakami's 13-meter-wide 'Rakuchu-Rakugai-zu Byobu: Iwasa Matabei RIP,' based on Iwasa Matabei's Edo Period (1603-1868) National Treasure screens depicting life in Kyoto, which the artist has updated since 2023. Finally, 99 life-sized wolf sculptures in Cai Guo-Qiang's 'Head On,' which has traveled all over the world from its debut in Berlin, now live on Naoshima as part of Fukutake's collection. Cai Guo-Qiang, 'Head On' (2006) | Thu-Huong Ha After the subterranean wolves, there's respite at the museum cafe. Breezy at the same time that it feels slightly weighted by the sea air and charged by the energy of trees tossed by the wind, the space contains a newly commissioned work by Indian artist N. S. Harsha. Harsha seized the chance to work on the cafe. 'I really like when art is positioned in a place where it's not exactly a museum, it's at the threshold,' he says. 'Happy Married Life' consists of panels telling three stages of a story about a wedding. 'It's been a longtime idea of mine to get a microscope and telescope married. I wanted them to get married. It's time!' the artist says, chuckling. It's playful and joyful — Harsha's name means 'happiness,' so it sort of goes with the territory, he says — but the work also represents a union between what he sees as two components inside each of us, internal and external visions. That cheer is somewhat at odds with the depictions of suffering and political critiques on display throughout the rest of the museum, but it's a nice moment of whimsy against Ando's sleek, spare monochrome. It's worth noting that the new museum is one of the few art spaces on Naoshima that allows photography. Perhaps that's why the museum leans a bit too heavily on large-scale, Instagram-worthy crowd-pleasers. Which is unfortunate because the mix of critical Japanese works and works by younger Southeast Asian artists makes the Naoshima New Museum of Art otherwise a welcome addition to the larger Western-focused Benesse complex. N. S. Harsha, 'Happy Married Life' (2025) | Thu-Huong Ha Most of the indoor Naoshima spaces have long had a no-photo policy, which allows for more actual art-viewing, as opposed to the kind of look-at-me-looking-at-art experience that has become the norm at clogged art shows. One has to wonder if the new photography policy is pandering in a way Naoshima has largely been able to avoid (with the exception of its famous pumpkin, the rare public artwork that has its own self-governing line). Fukutake's shift to Asian art is more than a lofty vision of the world's future creative center — it's a shrewd commercial move for the tycoon who's already completely remade the island and region. Takamatsu Airport serves daily low-cost flights to and from Seoul, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Taipei, making Naoshima an international weekend getaway that's as convenient (or inconvenient) from East Asia as from Tokyo. Streets of old-style Japanese houses are wedged in with cafes catering to foreign tourists, and a quiet slope is quickly interrupted by visitors shouting to each other as they fly by on motorized bicycles. The ferries and long queues are filled with the bustling excitement of languages from around the world, people holding up their phones, ready to look and be looked at. The entrance to the Naoshima New Museum of Art displays its oddly hard to read logo. | Thu-Huong Ha For more information about the Naoshima New Museum of Art, visit
Hypebeast
03-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Hypebeast
Naoshima's New Museum by Tadao Ando Embraces Environmental Harmony
Summary Tadao Ando, the acclaimed Japanese architect renowned for his masterful use of concrete, light and space, has unveiled his latest creation on Naoshima Island: the Naoshima New Museum of Art. Situated on a hilltop near the Honmura district, the museum marks a significant addition to Japan'sBenesse Art Sitein Naoshima. Having just opened its doors last week, it is also Ando's tenth architectural project for the renowned art destination. The three-story structure, featuring two underground levels and a ground floor, is designed to seamlessly integrate with its natural surroundings, reflecting Ando's signature approach to minimalist architecture and environmental harmony. The museum's design emphasizes natural light and spatial fluidity, with a central staircase illuminated by a skylight, guiding visitors into the underground galleries. The black plaster exterior, reminiscent of traditional burned cedar and stacked pebble walls, further enhances its connection to the local landscape. Inside, the museum houses four gallery spaces dedicated to major works and site-specific commissions from artists across Japan, China, Korea, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines. The inaugural exhibition,From the Origin to the Future, features large-scale installations by 12 prominent and emerging artists, offering visitors a dynamic yet unhurried artistic experience. Unlike previous Benesse Art Site Naoshima facilities, which focus primarily on permanent exhibitions, this museum introduces a rotating exhibition model, ensuring that each visit presents something new. Beyond its indoor galleries, the museum extends its artistic engagement to outdoor spaces and a café area, providing visitors with panoramic views of the Seto Inland Sea. As the first museum to bear the name of Naoshima, it aims to deepen its connection to the local community, creating a harmonious blend of art, architecture, nature and daily life. Naoshima New Museum of Art3299-73 Naoshima,761-3110 Kagawa, Japan
