Antique

The Chichu Art Museum, designed by celebrated Japanese architect Tadao Anda, is built mostly underground. Open courtyards and skylights bring in natural light. The island is internationally known for its works of modern art and architecture.

Art can enlighten, soothe, challenge and provoke. Sometimes it can transform a community.
Case in point: a 5.5-square-mile island called Naoshima in Japan's Seto Inland Sea.

Once upon a time, the biggest employer on Naoshima was a Mitsubishi metals processing plant. Actually, it's still the biggest employer, just not nearly as big as it once was.

Blame automation. The population of the island has dropped from around 8,000 in the 1950s and 1960s to a little over 3,000 now.

In Japan, this is not that strange. Populations of small towns are declining all over the country. Some towns are disappearing altogether. The reasons are a combination of the country's overall shrinking population and an increase in the number of people moving from rural areas to big cities.



Hiroshi Sugimoto's Time Exposed seascape is exhibited at the Benesse House Museum.

Naoshima might have been headed for the same relentless decline.

Enter Benesse Holdings, an education and publishing conglomerate based in the nearby city of Okayama. Its best-known brand is Berlitz, the language school company. Benesse's other claim to fame is its world-class modern art collection, including paintings by Claude Monet, Frank Stella and Andy Warhol, as well as many Japanese artists less famous in the U.S.

The former head of Benesse Holdings, Soichiro Fukutake, wanted a special home for the collection, someplace where it would have a local impact and could also be shared with the wider world.

more...