Kuroshio Choritsu Ogata Library

 

Out in the middle of nowhere in Japan, you will come across huge, modern architectural marvels.

They come from a period in Japan before the bubble burst and the government was throwing huge sums of money at the provincial towns. Actually, the money was headed to the coffers of the construction industry, the Japanese equivalent of the American Military-Industrial Complex.

The vast majority of these projects were some kind of cultural centre,... museums, auditoriums etc and often with a local theme.

So, on the Kuroshio coast of the SW part of Kochi and Shikoku, we have this structure.

It is a combination of public library, literary museum, and a cultural centre.

My wifes cousins family are Zen priests nearby, so I have visited before. This time I was walking the long section of the Ohenro Pilgrimage between 2 widely spaced temples. The previous post can be seen by clicking this link.

Not only steps to the roof, but bench seating for outdoor performances....

The literary museum is dedicated to a local, 20th-century author whose pen name was Akatsuki Kambayashi.

Real name, Tokohiro Iwaki, he died in 1980 and wrote in the I Novel genre.

I read almost no fiction nowadays and so am not at all familiar with his work.

The architect was Norihilo Dan, a man whose other works I am not familiar with, though he seems to be well known for his environmental concerns.

I like the structure.

I like buildings that surprise with different arrangements of light and space as you explore a building.

It must have been quite impressive when newly built, with its gleaming white exterior.

Unfortunately the Japanese weather is not kind to exposed concrete, especially when white.

Maybe its wabi sabi.....

The previous post in this series on my walks between temples on the Shikoku Pilgrimage was on the stormy Kuroshio Coast.

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Inside Tadaji Temple

 

The honzon of Tada-ji temple in Hamada is an Eleven-faced Kannon, but it is a secret Buddha only visible once a year.

However, there is a Thousand-armed Kannon to be seen...

And to my great delight, several Fudo statues......

However, perhaps the most interesting thing to see are the 59 wooden statues which I have earlier referred to as "drowned Buddhas".

They were discovered floating in the sea below Tada-ji in 1870.

They have been dated to the Kamakura Period, and are about 1,000 years old.

In 1868 the new government unofficially encouraged anti-Buddhist sentiment, and in some areas this led to the destruction of many temples and their treasures.

On the Oki islands for instance, every single temple was destroyed. In other areas nothing was touched.

It seems to have been very much based on situations where local priests were particularly oppressive to the people, rather than any ideological or religious reasons.

The currents along the coast here are from the west, so its seems that the statues drifted from the west over a two year period.

One would think that with such a major collection of statues, and the known currents and time frames it would be possible to figure out where they came from.

Apparently not. The whole anti-Buddhist movement is avoided as a topic, which may explain the reluctance to find out....

After already being very old and probably somewhat deteriorated due to age, plus two years knocked around in water, has led to some eerie expressions on some of the statues.....

If you are visiting Tadaji, it is well worth ringing the bell at the priests house and office and having them open the main hall for you.

This link will take you to a short, earlier post on the drowned Buddhas.

The previous post in this series was on the exterior and grounds of the temple.

If you would like to subscribe by email, just leave your email address in the comments below. It will not be published or made public. I post new content almost every day, and send out an email about twice a month with short descriptions and links to the last ten posts.

Leading the Blind..Tactile Paving...Tenji Block...

 

Street Photography where the subject is actually the street, and not the people.....

Tactile paving is the most common of many names given to the raised bumps and lines on  floors that guide visually-impaired people.

In Japan, they are known as Tenji Blocks, with tenji being the Japanese word for braille.

Every announcement warning of imminent train arrivals at Japanese stations insists you must stand behind the "tenji buroku."

In fact, the system of tactile paving was invented in Japan and first used in Okayama in 1967. In time the system spread to many other countries.

While there is some diversity, basically the system uses a grid of raised bumps to indicate hazard, and raised lines to indicate direction.

Yellow is by far the most common colour, and the UK in particular insists on strong colour contrast, but as can be seen from some of these photos from Japan, it is not always the case.

Plastic seems to be the most common material, but metal is sometimes used and even wood. The 3rd photo below shows some formed by pressing a mold into a kind of molten plastic asphalt.

In combination with different coloured paving and tiling, plus drainage systems, and shadows, it leads to some striking visual designs, though unfortunately invisible to completely blind individuals.

For fans of geometric abstractions like myself, they make a great subject for photos....