The Art of Rice

A Sengoku warrior on horseback

The name Inakadate usually doesn’t conjure up any specific imagery of Japan in one’s head. It has a population of around 8700 people and it is situated about 965km (600 miles) away north of Tokyo. Mount Fuji, vending machines, futuristic miniature technologies, karaoke, boxy cars, pokemon, anime, maid cafes, cosplayers, mechas … have nothing to do with this village in the Aomori prefecture. So why does Inakadate make it to JHYPE?

Every year, hundreds of volunteers and villagers in this rural town create rice field art by planting four different varieties of rice in late May across huge swathes of paddy fields in special patterns. Let’s have a look at some of the truly AMAZING works of rice crop art in Inakadate (and beyond).

Napolean on horseback can be seen from the skies, created by precision planting and months of planning between villagers and farmers in Inakadate

The murals in Inakadate cover 15,000 square metres of paddy fields. From ground level, the designs are invisible, and viewers have to climb the mock castle tower of the village office to get a glimpse of the work.

What’s amazing about these artwork is the sheer scale of them. It’s probably hard to appreciate how much planning and work goes into each one of these till you come up close at eye level.

Closer to the image, the careful placement of thousands of rice plants in the paddy fields can be seen

The different varieties of rice plant grow alongside each other to create the masterpieces

And over the past few years, other villages have joined in with the plant designs. Another famous rice paddy art venue is in the town of Yonezawa in the Yamagata prefecture. It shows the fictional 16th-century samurai warrior Naoe Kanetsugu and his wife, Osen, whose lives feature in television series Tenchijin.

Fictional warrior Naoe Kanetsugu and his wife Osen appear in fields in the town of Yonezawa, Japan

At this point, if you are like me, you’d be curious how these works of art are produced over time. So here’s a video that I prepared earlier (courtesy of Pink Tentacle). Enjoy!