Towada Art Center

Sunday, August 15: Towada City Museum of Art

Relatively new, the Towada Art Center opened in 2008 and merges Japanese and international modern, contemporary, and pop art. Both the outside and the inside of the museum aesthetically please the eye.

Excerpt from Towada City Tourist Guidebook

Museum has English handout (yeah!)

Museum entrance fees costs ¥500 for the permanent collection and ¥600 for the special exhibit. When viewed on the same day, there is a ¥200 discount. If you are short on money and unsure about who is featured for the special exhibit, purchase a ticket for the permanent exhibit. As with many Japanese museums, purchase tickets from a vending machine located next to the information desk. After purchasing your ticket, make sure to ask for parking validation, otherwise you will have to pay for parking.

Upon approaching the museum, one cannot help but catch a glimpse of the massive horse on Kanchogai-dori. Created by South Korean installation artist Jeong Hwa Choi, this horse adorned with colorful flowers conspicuously welcomes visitors to Towada Art Center.

Nonoru Tsubaki’s (Japanese) mutant red ant, aTTA, protects the west side of the museum.

At 4m tall, Ron Mueck’s (Australian) Standing Woman disconcerts visitors. Her wrinkled pallid flesh, gaping smoky pupils, and bulging azure veins, mesmerize guests because of its disturbing authentic human resemblance. No picture allowed because it was inside the museum. However, if you’ve never heard of him, definitely Google for images of his jarring sculptures.

Do-Ho Suh’s (another South Korean artist) installation also caught my attention. Appearing like a gigantic jelly-fish chandelier, these almost transparent shapes slowly change hues in a continuum from red, to orange, and translucent.

Upon further speculation, one will notice that over ten thousand piggy-backing figures form the finished work. This picture was taken through the window from the outside. (I really need to get a polarizing filter.)

Across the street, exists a permanent outdoor installation by Yayoi Kusama (Japanese) titled, Love Forever, Singing in Towada. As noted on the Towada Art Center webpage, subjects of multiplying polka dots hails from her childhood hallucinatory experiences during her stay in New York during the 60s.

Ghost by Inges Idee (Compromised of four German artists – Hans Hemmert, Axel Lieber, Thomas A. Schmidt, and Georg Zeyit)

Towada Art Center Hours: 09:00 – 17:00

Closed: Mondays (Tuesdays if Monday is a holiday)

Phone: 0176-20-1127; Website: http://www.city.towada.lg.jp/artstowada/eng/index.html

Towada City Art Center getting there from Misawa AFB

http://traveling-tengco.blogspot.com/2010/08/towada-city-aomori-prefecture-maps.html

Follow driving directions numbers 1 - 12 from my Aug 2010 blog: Towada City Directions and Maps.

Follow the signs and make a right on to Kanchogai-dori (Horse Street).

Turn right at the street corner of the museum. Proceed forward two blocks to a parking lot on the left. This is FREE museum parking. When you purchase your ticket at Towada Art Center, make sure to ask for parking validation, otherwise you will have to pay for parking.